Engineering

tracker-man

I would love to hear from someone who did Engineering at third level (Whatever discipline it is, Biomedical, Civil, Electronic etc.).

oisin_t

Im currently doing Engineering at 3rd level if that any good to you?! 3rd Aeronautical in UL

Pembily

Course - Mechanical Engineering in GMIT

Year - 4 years for an Honours Degree but you get an Ordinary Degree after 3 years.

Sorry not sure of points or places but you do not need honours maths to get into the course!!!

Content - It is maths based alot, I did Hns Maths, Hns Chemistry and Pass Physics and having done them really helped!!! The course is tough, mostly guys (I was one of 5 girls in 1st year but am the only girl in 4th year) but it is a very good rewarding varied course.

Subjects 1st - 3rd year include (names vary year to year)
Engineering Science - basically physics and chemistry

Control Engineering - sensors, how to control stuff (lights, tv, heating systems), very physicy

Thermodynamics / Fluid Mechanics - how liquids and heat affect each other

Mechanical Engineering - varies depending on the year - cams, breaks and other car stuff like that, how they work and how to design them, stress and strain - where, when and how stuff (steel beams, bridges, concrete, aluminium) will break and how to design it against failure.

Pro Engineer - A 3D computer engineering design program

Manufacturing Engineering - varies depending on the year - making stuff on lathes, drills and other machines like that (made a vice grips), doing programming to make a CNC machine make a pen.

Mechanical Eng is a very very broad degree. In final year there are at the minute 3 streams you can do -

Biomedical - Very big area in Ireland and especially Galway, kinda recession proof too!! Very design based and biology based but suits some people...

Product Design - Very broad area and you can go into many areas (biomedical, insulation, car parts) once qualified!!! Again design based obviously but broader than biomedical!!

Energy - I am doing this stream and I love it, would kinda be a bit of an energy nerd!!! We are doing Energy Systems and Energy Management this year, systems is quite maths / electrical stuff and management is what is says!!! Also do sustainability which is how to keep the earth alive for us to live on it.

Timetable - I have always had at least 4 9am mornings and 4 6pm finishes... Timetable is always pretty hectic and have generally about 30hours a week!!!!

Any engineering course is practical and is taught better (in my opinion and I have been in an IT and a Uni) in an IT as they have the ability to practically teach it!!!
Love the course though Any other q pm me!!

oisin_t

Pembily wrote: »

Any engineering course is practical and is taught better (in my opinion and I have been in an IT and a Uni) in an IT as they have the ability to practically teach it!!!

Dont want to go off topic here...but thats a broad and sweeping statement to say. Unless you have attended every single Uni and every single IT you cant really say that. Each Uni and IT are unique and offer different things. for eg. Trinity MAY be better than WIT however, CIT could be better than DCU.

Its different for each indvidual place.

From what i know and have heard, the two strongest engineering uni/IT would be CIT and UL. then again thats my opinion...

pljudge321

oisin_t wrote: »

Dont want to go off topic here...but thats a broad and sweeping statement to say. Unless you have attended every single Uni and every single IT you cant really say that. Each Uni and IT are unique and offer different things. for eg. Trinity MAY be better than WIT however, CIT could be better than DCU.

Its different for each indvidual place.

From what i know and have heard, the two strongest engineering uni/IT would be CIT and UL. then again thats my opinion...

Exactly, my course has a reputation for being extremely theoretical and heavy on the maths/physics side of things and light on the practical side of things.

Will this make me a worse engineer than someone graduating from an IT who has more practical skills but less understanding of the principles underlying the field? Its completely subjective and dependent on the field you are going to end up in, it will also become mostly irrelevant in a couple of years time anyway.

Also the quality of the individual course in each place can vary as well.

pljudge321

oisin_t wrote: »

So wait, you said you went to GMIT, which you said earlier was better because it was an IT, and you said IT's were more practical. So if it was extremely theoretical, and light on the practical side of things, that kind of contradicts what you were saying earlier?

I never said I went to GMIT, are you mixing me up with Pembily by any chance?

Im doing Electrical/Electronic in UCD.

oisin_t

pljudge321 wrote: »

I never said I went to GMIT, are you mixing me up with Pembily by any chance?

Im doing Electrical/Electronic in UCD.

very sorry man my bad

pljudge321

oisin_t wrote: »

very sorry man my bad

I can see why you were confused though

Any professional Electrical engineers I have talked to have been quite optimistic with regards to future and current career prospects. Its a growing field and the number of yearly graduates are quite low compared to some of the other disciplines like Mech or Civil. Elec and Mech are quite related though and it would be possible to move into either with a bit more training.

kenon

Course - Electronic and Computer Engineering in ITB

Year - 5 years for an Honours Degree but you get an Ordinary Degree after 3 years. (I'm in 5th year now)

Content - First few weeks you are taught to solder and learn about voltage, current, resistance etc and about electrical components, resistors, capacitors etc etc.

Start off with the basics, circuit theory, digital electronics etc. Maths is just built on from Honours Leaving Cert maths to start. You don't need Honours maths to get into the course. Theres a maths module every semester up to 5th year. Maths features in nearly all the subjects.

Second semester you are introduced to C programming. Theres a fair bit of programming throughout the course. C will be your strongest language when you finish but you will be solid in java, MATLAB, visual basic and a few assembly languages, intel, BASIC, motorola to name but a few. Theres a common myth that you have to be brilliant at maths to be able to program, its not true. You just need to think logically and have a good attention to detail.

As you go on, you start doing modules on networking, manufacturing, digital communications and stuff like VLSI.

You do a final year project in 3rd and 5th year which normally forces you to use everything you have been taught. If you get a good project to do, the project can be enjoyable as you call the shots.

Timetable - Average of about 30 hours a week.

Thats all I can think of at the moment as Forrest Gump on channel 4 is distracting me...I might come back and edit this post when its over.

Overall, an excellent course and ITB is a great place to do it.

Krieg

Industrial engineering (Now called engineering mgmt), GMIT

I could almost copy & paste what Pembily has wrote as both courses are similar and we share quite a few lectures with mechanical engineers.

The difference is that industrial engineering is more theoretical and perhaps more broad since it includes subjects like Organisational behaviour (psychology). The qualification is a good ticket to get into mgmt position in industrial environments (factorys etc.)

Other subjects include communications, operations mgmt, workshop, project mgmt, enginerring science, control engineering, software (Various softwares including CAD and programming, we also did a semester on creating our own websites), engineering design process, quality mgmt, health and safety. And of course maths in its many forms.

From what ive seen, majority of industrial engineers are in factory mgmt, some have become technicians. Those with a wealth of experience can go their own way and take up contracting which can be very lucrative and interesting.

Feel free to PM me if anyone has questions

REFLINE1

tracker-man wrote: »

I would love to hear from someone who did Engineering at third level (Whatever discipline it is, Biomedical, Civil, Electronic etc.).

Course: Civil Engineering (First year was Undenominated Eng)

College: NUI Galway -(Good & well regarded course,solid lecturers,and i believe facilities have been upgraded since)

Subjects studied: Stuctures,Mechanics of solids,Hyraulics,Hydrology,Soil Mechanics,Numerical Analysis,Structural Design,Computational Methods,Project Managment,Engineering Mathematics.

Employment op's : They were good 5 years ago but as you all know not so hot now.I ended up working on site with a Main contractor. It was about 50/50 for my class, consultancy work V's Contractor route.

Just came over to post here after seeing this http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055794321

I did a degree in "Applied Physics and Instrumentation" in CIT, graduated in 2003. First worked in Wyeth in Dublin as a process technician (didn't need to have a degree), was a start up project for the first 18 months or so, great experience. I then worked as a technical sales engineer for a water treatment company, mainly looking after clients in the food, plastics and pharma industries. 'twas mainly steam boilers, cooling towers and extrusian plants I worked in, had to learn a bit about chemistry on the job for that role. Wasn't a bad job, good wages and a company car but wasn't for me so stuck it out for a year and then went contracting as an engineer. Have worked in three places over the last 3 and a half years. I have worked as a validation engineer, project engineer and am currently a quality engineer. Interestingly I have met people working as quality engineers who have business degrees and folks working as manufacturing engineers who have chemical engineering degrees in plants that don't have any chemicals to speak of.

What I'm trying to get across is that the college course you take won't pigeon hole you totally, many engineering graduates are now going into the likes of KPMG as apprentice accountants, no doubt that wouldn't have been the plan.

Don't let the current recession put you off going to college, if you want to and can do go to college, it mightn't bring you to where you think you want to go now but life is like that

pljudge321

In Response to a PM tracker-man sent me asking about the Electronic & Electrical Engineering course in UCD

Hi,

Sorry for the delay in getting back to you.

As a start here's a list of modules for the first three years of the course https://myucd.ucd.ie/program.do?programID=63

At the end of year three you choose to either specialise in either Electronic or Electrical engineering for your final degree. I can't find a list of modules for fourth year but they generally are the ones that look the most interesting (in title at least). Stuff like Power System, Wind Energy and Neural Engineering.

To get into the E&E course in UCD from next year you will have to do the omnibus engineering. The first year is a shared year between all the different discliplines with a few option modules that you have to pick to enter specific streams next year. For example to get into E&E or Mechanical you have to use one of your options to take a programming module, to get into civil you would have to do the drawing module. Being in an omnibus course is also an extremely good decision as well, I would recommend it no matter which college you end up going to.

The actual maths modules so far haven't been extremely hard, I am quite mathsy though. They are a good bit beyond leaving cert but the notes are excellent and the exams tend to be extremely predictable and manageable as long as you have put the work in during the semester and have done all of the tutorials. The maths modules are shared between all the different disciplines so you will be doing the same stuff as us if you end up doing chemical or whatever. In the E&E course a lot of the maths you study does come up with practical applications in the actual engineering modules, some of the maths you do is less relevant if you are studying some of the other disciplines. Some people in the class have been struggling with some of the maths but I think that is mostly down to us enjoying ourselves too much. We have been warned that the maths next year (3rd) is notoriously hard but after that we are finished all of the maths modules in the course.

The course is definitely one that is suited to people who enjoy physics, maths and computer programming. A lot of the later modules in the course have programming elements as parts of labs etc when stuff gets too complicated to do yourself.

This is actually a really good website to look at (if you can get past the whole Britney Spears thing) to give you an idea of what study electronic engineering is like. It explains how semiconductor devices operate and gives you an appreciation of just how scarily complicated even a simple calculator is. Don't be put off by the maths, you get used to reading equations like this, they would have set me running two years ago though.

http://britneyspears.ac/physics/basics/basics.htm

The stuff on this website would correlate to the Solid State Electronics modules in 2nd and 3rd year. The more practical stuff is in other modules but this is the stuff that underpins practically everything else in the course.

I would e-mail the engineering programme office and ask to talk to one of the E&E lecturers and a current 3rd or 4th year student.

If you have any other questions or I left anything out just ask.

Good Luck with whatever end up doing

podgemonster

I did Electronic, Electrical and Microelectronic Eng in UCC, its a really good course for keeping you options open and you do stuff lik computer programming, robotics, management, mechanical engineering, Integrated circuit design, microelectronics, energy engineering and has work placement (imo if a course doesnt have work placement forget about it).

Be prepared to have over 36 hours a week after 1st year. Cant say it was easy either, some lecturerers are quite poor and it is more theory based but they are making it more practical (had 16 hours of labs in 2nd and 3rd yr), personally I dont think having more theory is a bad thing but practical stuff is still vital.

There is a new course called Energy engineering basically elec eng with some civil thrown in and focuses on renewables. Its a money makers for the college, Elec eng would be just almost the same course and 200 points less!

Krieg

Krieg wrote: »

From what ive seen, majority of industrial engineers are in factory mgmt, some have become technicians. Those with a wealth of experience can go their own way and take up contracting which can be very lucrative and interesting.

I think that is a tad misleading to folks in second level education, engineers who progress to management do so based largely on personality and drive, their primary qualification is rarely a consideration.

pljudge321

podgemonster wrote: »

I did Electronic, Electrical and Microelectronic Eng in UCC, its a really good course for keeping you options open and you do stuff lik computer programming, robotics, management, mechanical engineering, Integrated circuit design, microelectronics, energy engineering and has work placement (imo if a course doesnt have work placement forget about it).

Be prepared to have over 36 hours a week after 1st year. Cant say it was easy either, some lecturerers are quite poor and it is more theory based but they are making it more practical (had 16 hours of labs in 2nd and 3rd yr), personally I dont think having more theory is a bad thing but practical stuff is still vital.

There is a new course called Energy engineering basically elec eng with some civil thrown in and focuses on renewables. Its a money makers for the college, Elec eng would be just almost the same course and 200 points less!

My course doesn't do a work placement, it just means if you want some experience before you graduate you have to put the effort in to get some engineering work during the summer. We asked the head of our department if they were ever going to consider bringing in an official work placement but he said that he felt a full four years was barely enough time to teach the entire course without giving up an entire semester.

The lecturers will be happy to use their contacts to try get you in somewhere for the summer if you ask.

Also I agree with the sentiments about the energy engineering course, I've heard some bad things about it.

podgemonster

30% of CEO's in this country are Engineers.

Engineering courses encourage planning and problem solving. Naturally if you dont have drive you wont get very far up the ladder in any industry.

podgemonster

podgemonster wrote: »

and has work placement (imo if a course doesnt have work placement forget about it).

I agree 100%, hitting the ground running is essential in todays climate so having spent time on work experience is invaluable. Most places will keep you on for the summer after you finish your placement so you would have six months experience. Organising your own during summer holidays etc is fine in theory but for the last few years people looking for work experience as part of their course have struggled to get it so it is really difficult to get work for the summer unless you are well connected in a company (family etc).

podgemonster

podgemonster wrote: »

30% of CEO's in this country are Engineers.

Engineering courses encourage planning and problem solving. Naturally if you dont have drive you wont get very far up the ladder in any industry.

I agree, I was however remarking that it is misleading to say the majority of industrial engineers become managers

pljudge321

RoverJames wrote: »

I agree, I was however remarking that it is misleading to say the majority of industrial engineers become managers

It is the case though that in most engineering companies being an engineer is almost a requisite for becoming a manager. You can't manage what you don't understand.

pljudge321

pljudge321 wrote: »

It is the case though that in most engineering companies being an engineer is almost a requisite for becoming a manager. You can't manage what you don't understand.

Yep, I never said otherwise

pljudge321

RoverJames wrote: »

Yep, I never said otherwise

That was more for other peoples benefit anyway . I think its important for prospective engineering students realise that an engineering degree is a very good springboard for moving into practically any other career path, whether it be in finance, actuary, research, business. You are not hemmed into an engineering career at all once you graduate.

hmmmm52

any chemical engineers able to shed some light on their course?
I really just picked this discipline because phys and chem would be my favourite subjects. . . . but after seeing this thread i don't think I really know enough about the course and maybe an omnibus year would be a better choice?
any help would be greatly appreciated...

muboop1

hmmmm52 wrote: »

any chemical engineers able to shed some light on their course?
I really just picked this discipline because phys and chem would be my favourite subjects. . . . but after seeing this thread i don't think I really know enough about the course and maybe an omnibus year would be a better choice?
any help would be greatly appreciated...

PM me if u have any questions

MarcusFenix

From what i know and have heard, the two strongest engineering uni/IT would be CIT and UL. then again thats my opinion...[/QUOTE]

Ive come through the system in CIT and would recommend it, every year the place brings in 00,000s in prize money from engineering comps.