Mechanical Aptitude / Can You Do It Yourself?

[Smellincoffee]

My father is a mechanic. He did it for a living, repairing helicopters for the Air Force and later diesel engines for various trucking companies. Anything around his house he wants to do, he can make happen. Closet collapse? Get some wood, a saw, hey presto he's got a new shelf. Plumbing go berserk? He'll command the waters to cease with a wave of a wrench, then find the part that has gone to pieces and replace it. He is a man who can make life better with his hands.

I, on the other hand, am a putz. I was never in the least interested in mechanical stuff as a child. I would grow up, go to college, get a nice soft office job, and pay people to do that FOR me. I was the family oddball; a reader, a writer, someone who even as a teenager wanted to go to art museums on vacation. As I start my third decade, however, the childish disinclination against that kind of work has long vanished. I am increasingly interested in self-reliance, and graduating into the middle of a recession with a liberal arts degree has made me well aware of the error of my ways. I'm older, now, wishing I had something more to show for my time on earth, something to prove my worth by. If I had gone to HVAC training, I would not have student loans to worry about! At the very least, I wish I could do things around the house. I wonder, is it too late to learn?

Are some people simply born more mechanically inclined, and able, than others? My interest in being able to do things stems from wanted to be able to DO things, not out of an interest in technology itself. I want to be someone who -- if he can't frame a house -- can at least build a chair out of wooden planks, or figure out what is wrong with a sputtering car. I have studied manuals for things like my bicycle in an attempt to understand the nuances of something like the workings of the sprocket, but then I encounter extended discussion on gear ratios and I back away into a corner like a frightened puppy. I fear that I don't have that instinct for grasping how things fit together, that spatial reckoning. But I don't want to be doomed to understanding life in theory; I want that practical knowledge, that techne.

Is it possible, through practice, to become more mechanically able? What kind of projects are suitable to learn for someone like me, with the abilities of a slightly dazed chimpanzee?

And, for the poll -- how much tinkering and home improvement do you do?

 

[Zelig]

Manual labour is trivially easy for the most part. I'm only ever limited by lack of equipment.

And my soldering skills aren't great, I'd need to practice to get better, but don't need to solder stuff often enough to make practicing worthwhile, so I have paid to have bunch of capacitors/resistors replaced on a speaker amp. Can't think of anything else off the top of my head that I haven't done myself.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

My father is a mechanic. He did it for a living, repairing helicopters for the Air Force and later diesel engines for various trucking companies. Anything around his house he wants to do, he can make happen. Closet collapse? Get some wood, a saw, hey presto he's got a new shelf. Plumbing go berserk? He'll command the waters to cease with a wave of a wrench, then find the part that has gone to pieces and replace it. He is a man who can make life better with his hands.

I, on the other hand, am a putz. I was never in the least interested in mechanical stuff as a child. I would grow up, go to college, get a nice soft office job, and pay people to do that FOR me. I was the family oddball; a reader, a writer, someone who even as a teenager wanted to go to art museums on vacation. As I start my third decade, however, the childish disinclination against that kind of work has long vanished. I am increasingly interested in self-reliance, and graduating into the middle of a recession with a liberal arts degree has made me well aware of the error of my ways. I'm older, now, wishing I had something more to show for my time on earth, something to prove my worth by. If I had gone to HVAC training, I would not have student loans to worry about! At the very least, I wish I could do things around the house. I wonder, is it too late to learn?

Are some people simply born more mechanically inclined, and able, than others? My interest in being able to do things stems from wanted to be able to DO things, not out of an interest in technology itself. I want to be someone who -- if he can't frame a house -- can at least build a chair out of wooden planks, or figure out what is wrong with a sputtering car. I have studied manuals for things like my bicycle in an attempt to understand the nuances of something like the workings of the sprocket, but then I encounter extended discussion on gear ratios and I back away into a corner like a frightened puppy. I fear that I don't have that instinct for grasping how things fit together, that spatial reckoning. But I don't want to be doomed to understanding life in theory; I want that practical knowledge, that techne.

Is it possible, through practice, to become more mechanically able? What kind of projects are suitable to learn for someone like me, with the abilities of a slightly dazed chimpanzee?

And, for the poll -- how much tinkering and home improvement do you do?

Your dad and my dad sound a lot alike. My dad was a mechanic for many years, even had his own repair business. Sometimes he was paid in cash, sometimes in kind (that's how we ended up with four geese, which became pets instead of dinner). My dad could also do plumbing, electrical work, and he built a garage and apartment add-on in which he made everything from the foundation to the finishing touches on the furniture. He made most of the bookshelves I own, plus my rug-hooking frame that's big and strong enough to do a large quilt on! He was musical, and knew his way around a farm, lumber mill, gas plant, oil rig, and kitchen (his cooking was better than my grandmother's). He was also a hunter and could train dogs. He never went past Grade 8, but was good enough at math to be able to help me with my math-based homework when I had a particularly frustrating assignment for one of my physical geography labs in college. He and I share an interest in astronomy and geology and Doctor Who. So if there was ever any situation in which survival was a question, he's the one I wanted to be with.*

*My dad is still alive, but I use the past tense above because he no longer has these skills since becoming afflicted with dementia.

My skills... are much less. I can do very minor repairs, am handier with a screwdriver than a hammer, and when I make some three-dimensional object, I prefer to make it with 3-D needlepoint (aka plastic canvas).

Yes, it is possible to learn these skills. I'm handier with some tools now that I've got nobody around to do it for me (necessity, etc.). I also learned some skills while working backstage at the Red Deer College Arts Centre scene shop.

Overall, however... unless it's something I can sew together, I'm in the 'I can call a guy' category.

 

[Verarde]

I have some experience with woodworking. I spent the spring semester of my high school senior year as a part-time "apprentice" of sorts to one of the coolest guys you will ever meet. He was my neighbor (they moved away, unfortunately), and he and his wife spent their abundant free time (they were mostly retired) making things. He had a fantastic wood shop, and she did a lot of loom weaving. One of the best experiences I ever had.

I also have limited knowledge of computer hardware. I know enough to replace certain parts, but you can bet that I will have a step by step guide helping me along.


For everything else, there's Mastercard.

 

[Old Hippy]

if civilization collapses I can rebuild it, as long as I can find a guy to do electronic networking

 

[The_J]

Computer hardware has the most votes, what a surprise ^^.

It has probably something to do with the fact that our fathers (I assume most of them) are actually the DIY type of people that we can't do much on our own. Because hey, dad can do it.
I also predict that all the children of this generation will be morons with computers (because hey, dad can do it).


I can paint, but mostly because I had to help my father while renovating (also repapering the rooms). Never dealt with the electrical stuff, since he's an electrician.
If really necessary I could probably deal with some wood work, but it'd be shoddy, at best.

For the rest...yeah...I can ruin stuff, and I'm good at it ^^.

 

[James Stuart]

I can barely build a flat-pack shelf with instructions and an assistant.

 

[Borachio]

Woodwork, painting and gardening. Oh, and cooking (do those last two count? I mean, I'm using my hands and everything, but I guess there's some things I do with my hands that don't count as mechanical aptitude). Woodwork and painting, then. That's pretty much it.

Anything else and it results in nothing but embarrassment when I have to call some one to fix what I've only succeeded in making worse. I did fix a hoover motor once, but that was more luck than judgement.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Woodwork, painting and gardening. Oh, and cooking (do those last two count? I mean, I'm using my hands and everything, but I guess there's some things I do with my hands that don't count as mechanical aptitude). Woodwork and painting, then. That's pretty much it.

Anything else and it results in nothing but embarrassment when I have to call some one to fix what I've only succeeded in making worse. I did fix a hoover motor once, but that was more luck than judgement.

I would say that cooking counts as a mechanical aptitude-related skill. Clumsy people tend to have more accidents with knives, measuring, spilling stuff, and burning themselves than non-clumsy people do. It also helps to know how to operate a manual can opener. I met someone once who didn't know how to do that, and she was in a panic when the electric can opener didn't work.

Gardening counts, too. You need to know how to do stuff like digging, putting stakes in the ground, hoeing, etc. (yes, there are people on the planet who don't know how to do those things)

 

[Borachio]

Yeah. Thanks and everything. But although you need some mechanical aptitude not to cut yourself with a knife or stab yourself through the foot with a gardening fork, it's not really the same is it?

I've eaten nearly everything I've ever cooked. But that's not because of my skill with cooking (though I do like to cook), it's because I'm not a fussy eater.

And if I botch pruning a tree, luckily no one reports me for cruelty to a living thing.

 

[Gary Childress]

My dad is currently retired. He was a meat cutter by profession. He also loved to hunt "back in the day". I remember more than a few occasions we had a deer hanging up in the yard in the middle of suburbia Just across the river from Washington D.C. while my dad would be cutting it up for us to eat. Usually took him maybe a few hours to have everything chopped up and ready to go. Neighbors probably thought we were weird. (of course they were mistaken. My social etiquette is perfectly maladjusted).

I wish I had his practical knowledge but I'm pretty much unskilled labor, other than what I know about computer software and office automation. I was pretty good at flipping burgers at McDonald's in H.S., though. I could get three patties on a spatula and flip them all at once in a nice neat row. Many times when things got super busy they would pull me from the cash register and put me on grill. I was pretty diligent with a mop on lobby duty too.

 

[Cutlass]

I've learned some things over the years. Dad taught us a bit as kids. But in the end he'd rather do himself than teach us. So didn't learn a lot from him. Maybe we were lousy students, back in the day.

Since then, I'm mostly self taught. I'm not that good of a carpenter. Particularly, I can't get a good result on the finished work. But I can get a competent job up to the point of the finish work. I can install doors and windows, build a deck, a shed, frame out a wall or closet and hang the drywall, put up shelves, that sort of thing. I'm not much good at putting on the molding. I can do many basic plumbing and electrical repairs. Even put in new outlets and light fixtures. I can paint a house well enough. On cars, I can swap out parts well enough. Not so good at diagnosing problems. Can't do any metal work. Never tried any pottery. Can't really sew, beyond replacing a button. I assemble my own computers and set them up. But not so good at diagnosing a problem there either.

Basically, the finer the motor skills required, the more I'm out of my depth. On the homeowner level, I can do most of the things necessary to not have to 'call a guy'. Which I think should be the goal of anyone who isn't rich enough call a guy for anything which comes up, or poor enough to live with it or complain to the landlord. For a number of years, when you complained to the landlord, I was the guy he sent to fix the problems.

Oh, and I'm really not a good gardener, either.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I spent time as a foreman for a remodeling contractor, and spent four years trading handyman services for room and board. I wouldn't rebuild civilization, but I could survive without it.

 

[Gary Childress]

I spent time as a foreman for a remodeling contractor, and spent four years trading handyman services for room and board. I wouldn't rebuild civilization, but I could survive without it.

You could survive without civilization? Are you sure? Would you be able to survive in Somalia for example?

 

[Harv]

I am so mechanical, I think a screwdriver is something you drink.

 

[Borachio]

Surely somebody must be able to survive in Somalia. It's likely a diy expert's paradise.

 

[warpus]

I can paint, do some work with decks & lumber, install flooring, do computer hardware assembly and troubleshooting, and I think I'd be really good at waterboarding, but I have not tried it yet.

 

[Borachio]

Do you really mean waterboarding? That's the torture technique where you lay someone on a board at a slight angle and trickle water down their nose simulating drowning.

Or do you mean surfboarding: where you lie down on a board at a slight angle while water trickles down your nose simulating drowning? Some people tell me you should stand up on the surfboard, but I think that's just asking for trouble myself.

 

[Gary Childress]

I can paint, do some work with decks & lumber, install flooring, do computer hardware assembly and troubleshooting, and I think I'd be really good at waterboarding, but I have not tried it yet.

I'm sure you wouldn't do very well at waterboarding. You're too civilized. Only an American would be any good at waterboarding. I'm sure we'll learn to walk upright one of these days.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

You could survive without civilization? Are you sure? Would you be able to survive in Somalia for example?

Probably, but I wouldn't make the trip to find out.

In southern California if the power stops, the water stops. If the water stops, people die. In huge numbers. That's the 'end of civilization' that is of immediate relevance to me, and I have as good a chance of surviving it as anyone and way better than most.