Sooo I might not be in college much longer. In october I was in the hospital for this reoccuring heart issue that they never have an answer to but gladly charge $12,000 for. I end up forking $1,500 of it. Well it happened the past April as well so thats $3,000 total. This last time it happened at home and we went to the hospital and they decided to take me by ambulance all the way back here and that was another $400. The issue is just that something infects my heart for about 30 minutes and makes it seem like I'm having a heart attack. Doctors don't have a clue so they say I can sit in the hospital for months until it happens again, constantly monitoring me (what a life) or just go home cause they can never find any permanent damage. Anyhow from that and other things I am like $6,000 in debt as I just added it all up. Each month is an added $800 in bills. The list goes on and on. In addition, I also have $3000 worth of student loans.Thing is, I can't really learn from teachers. I go to class, listen to them read a book to me like in kindergarden, then I go home and read it again and teach myself how to do everything. With all the classes that means in a given day I spend 5 hours listening to them and then go home and spend another 5 hours teaching myself how to do it. I could get a job but I spend so much time researching things that I would quickly fall behind in school. Meaning if the lesson is about say logarithms for math class, I don't just learn what they show, I research it until I know every single part of it. I hate having "parts" of lessons as the class moves on. If I get started learning something, I don't want to have to keep picking pieces up off the floor every time we do something that adds to the puzzle, I want to do the puzzle all at once. I have tried doing it their way and just cannot limit myself with horse blinds to that extent, i just have to know more about it. And because of that it's like I am punished because obviously doing all that research for one class means another class falls behind. Then there is the cost.. How many books could I buy with $2500 a semester? That isn't including the books for the semester.. The library has an ungodddddly amount of books. The other day I grabbed the whole damn shelf worth of diesel books. I can learn 10x more from all of that, that pertains to what I want to know, than what I will ever learn in class. I have to take all these BS classes like psychology and whatnot. I know they apply somehow or another but I want to know a lot more than I have time for in a lifetime and that stuff isn't on my list. If you are the best at something, the money will come. Look at Dave Georend.. he is a great guy, is the best, and I'm sure has plenty to pay the bills. There are diesel shops like that as well but i know there are a lot more diesel shops that half @$$ everything. I am not looking so much to fix diesels as I am to innovate them. I want to change them to make them easier to work on, better, faster, stronger, more efficient... But then there is the thing about the piece of paper called a degree... Now I understand that gets you places, but at what cost? If you got a scholarship and all that then I can see it being nothing but advantageous. In my situation I am finding a lot of short comings. We had to sit in on the senior capstone project which is what the seniors do to prove they know something. So they all got in groups of 4 and made something to show future employers. Now I have worked in ethanol plants, factories of all sorts, and I must say, I was not impressed in the slightest. Most of these guys interned at boeing in the turbine division with lead roles in seeing that things got done. But these capstone projects were things like a plastic rib spreader with a 1 time use that had no mechanical leverage so only the bulkiest guy could use it. A gun target rotator to only show the side of the target as to hide it, that thing just spun around in circles as they didn't have the right programming. Then there was a flying wing that was a flotation device that you flew to someone who was drowning, but it looked like a kick board yet they said it would hold 300lbs but the employers had doubts and the students said they didnt actually test it, plus it only went 5 minutes on a battery charge. Then there was a nuclear core sample robot thinger which used such crappy servos that it had to be energized to hold position, when they turned it off the whole thing just collapsed. I mean I'm just not sure I see the point in spending so much time in class when I could teach myself what I want to know much faster and more thoroughly. It just comes down to what can I do without a degree yet knowing more than those guys.. I think I can take certification tests and stuff to get by but I don't know. At the same time, I don't really want an engineering job unless it is in the research and development area of some place. I know a 4.0 GPA engineer who was actually valedictorian in my HS class and he is now some nuclear engineer at a power plant doing menial tasks. I realize that is the american way; to get good grades in HS, get a degree, get a job, make money, retire.. But I don't want a "job". I want a career that changes the way we live in a beneficial way. Diesels that get 100MPG, fiber optic internet throughout the world, everything. I kinda see most engineers as just skilled maintenance workers. Anyhow, don't take offense to any of this if I said something, situations are different for everyone. What do you guys think?

Have you considered the very rewarding careers in the circus or carnival industry???:lmao:Just kidding. I don't know what to tell you man. I have a college degree. Do I need it doing what I do now?????? Absolutely not!!!!!! If I could do it differently, would I still go to college????? Yeah, maybe, I dunno. I do know this though...........if you can work with your hands, and are good at it, you'll always find work. Trick is finding what you're good at and if there's a market for it!!!Head up to NoDak and get a job in the oil fields there.

Now i'm going to make a statement here and to any engineers on this site, this isn't painting everyone with the same brush. ISX, my opinion on college, degree papers, etc...it's gone out of control. I work in a tire manufacturing buisness and I can tell you this, there seems to be an influx of engineers being hired and from what I see the majority of them that come into our plant are as dumb as a stick and have no clue about the real world. I have a high school degree, will admit I can be pretty stupid, but I can say when it comes to some of what I'm seeing out of these guys and girls, i'm a freakin genius!They have no work ethic, they have no energy, they have no common sense and have no willingness to ask the people that have been working with the machinery for 30+ years for advice on how to improve. They do what they want, when it goes wrong they don't admit their mistake but instead try to talk everyone around them into how their mistake is a good idea. Ex: a hoist lifting system for approx 75lbs, that they designed something to lift a freight train but it took 3 times as long to maneuver it around then it should've. End result, we had to put up with their mistake for 4 years until they finally took them out and threw them in a scrap pile...$150 000 later!Sad to see no company wants to look at people nowdays without a degree. I feel college is a place where alot of the lazy generation now go and pay alot of money for someone to eventually give them a piece of paper with a signature on it to say they're smart, whether they're the stupidest person on the planet or not .I agree with dorkweed, if you are good at what you do, degree or no degree you will always get work. If you're good i'd much rather pay someone like you $75/hr to work on my Cummins if I could, them someone like a Cummins dealership that charges $110/hr, because they have a papered mechanic that may in fact not know as much as you may. My father was old school, grade 7 education and the man could tear anything down and fix it, and he always had work in his life because his name got around that he was good, honest and wasn't out to rip people off. How do you get out there and get work without a degree, you start doing it on your own if you have to, get your name buzzing around. People talking is one of the best forms of advertising you can get. Thats my

Take care of your health first thing... :wink:I'm like you in a lot of ways. I've been crash studying Linux OS system so I can enhance my abilities at web site management. Yeah sure I could pay big money to go back to ITT Tech and throw $50,000 down and be a certified web site administrator. But wait a second... I've already tossed down $53,000 dollars 23 years ago in Van Nuys, CA at ITT Tech for computer and electronics. But what's really sad is the degree I've got is worthless today. I was trained for the 8088 Intel Processor and transistor FM radios. I'm sorry to say but that's completely obsolete now. Back when I went to ITT Tech the Internet was even public yet. So I look at a degree as something that is time limited 5-10 years from the time you get it your obsolete. So either you can school yourself like we both are or you can keep throwing thousands of dollars out chasing the next degree. But look at me I'm just a lowly Idahoian I'm not a diesel technician, I'm not ASE certified, I've never gone to school for a diesel engine ever! But to this day I get phone calls from all over the world... (Not a typo! yes the world!) and I help people with diesel issues might be easy and get them rolling or it might take some study work to figure out the issues. This where I typically fall back on my family here. I learn form the family members here about most problems. If it a rare one then I ask question or find someone with a answer.Like with any industry you go into no one is perfect and it human to error. But what set most of us apart from the general masses is the fact we learn from our mistakes and the mistakes of other family members here.ISX... I say go out there and chase your dreams.

coincedence here...There was a study reported yesterday on Fox news, that said exactly what you have stated. "Is a degree worth it these days"??The study basically said most BS degrees are NOT.

I think this is mostly true... a certificate may get your foot in the door but so can years of experience. After that, it's up to one to self educate or continuing educate... or get passed by. Many very successful guys started without or before getting degreed. It's largely about skill. There are a lot of "For Profit" schools these days... and one does not make back the return on investment.A young guy in our family, was uninspired... went to college & took classes... a fortunate storm closed the Florida Keys school & forced him home. Went to work with a family friend (ended up marrying the daughter) in HVAC... He liked it! The company paid to get him certified & licensed. After a time, he partnered with another familty member to form their own firm. They have plenty of work... Skilled Labor... is nothing to be ashamed of. I probably fall into that catagory. I'm in my element when I can be creative & do highest quality work.

People that work with their hands seem to have a better grasp on reality for creative design, solving problems and tackling new territory, or uncharted ground.To have the freedom to do what you want and advance in any direction, for the most part, means starting your own business. Success means actually caring about those you do biz with and those around you. Doing work like it is for yourself on your own truck and remaining honest. To research a subject will tell you how far the charts go. Beyond that it's all discovery.I don't think a college degree would count for much unless you owned the biz so you can be well rewarded according to what you contribute. Just a few cents tossed.BTW, Only once in 36 yrs was I asked for my credentials. That was for a bank loan. The rest saw my work and word was I was straight shooten'. The rest is history

ISX, I know you value wisdom as much as I do. Take some time and give this a watch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A75KERKwEQM

http-~~-//www.youtube.com/watch?v=A75KERKwEQM

As for my , I say get your butt out of college, get a paying job, get your debt under control and learn somthing while your getting paid. Our generation is in such a bad spot that college is not the answer.

Long video I'll have to get back to it but for the 10 minutes I did watch its spot on.

And here I thought I would get ridiculed for thinking this way Is really a relief that you all see it the same way. Yesterday I went over it with my mom and she didn't understand the problem. I then showed her a book that was 1000 pages, showed the 200 pages we would cover in it, meaning 800 pages we were just supposed to ignore. I told her I didn't want to ignore those pages, I wanted to know everything about a topic. She then explained that I didn't need to know everything about a topic and the 200/1000 pages to every book is all you need to know about every topic... The more I thought about it the more I realized that although I thought she was wrong, she was right in that that is all colleges seem to THINK you should know. The core ideals are in the first 200 pages of most of the books..so if you understand them, then they don't care if you know the finer details in the other 800 pages. But I have a huge problem with that. I told her thats called half@$$ing and that I went to a university to do exactly the opposite. I then took a step back and realized the entire USA is built on half@$$ing. That makes me want to study even harder to try and at least be a resisting force to the ever persistant H.A.ing force of the US. We have had almost 2 months off for xmas break, we don't go back till this Tuesday.. I thought that was ridiculous enough. In the 2 months I have been reading all of these injection pump books, measuring mine up, figuring stuff out, everyone else I know has been playing Xbox. Heaven forbid they try and do something out of the ordinary like learn something. I did watch the entirrree video and it does speak for a lot of things that are very apparent. The only reason I see to go to college is if you got a 30+ ACT where the whole thing is free.. Even then I am not sure because of the 200/1000 page book thing I mentioned. I ride dirt bikes with the 4.0 guy who has graduated already and he still has no clue about anything on the engine. You would think after all of the dynamics classes he would have been shown a carb. I do think part of the issue is having multiple interests. Seems to be very hard to do everything I want to know being that I want to know everything about them, not just "enough to get by".

There are a lot of "jobs" (for lack of a better term) where one only needs to know the overview... enough to say with a certainty "your injector pump is broke or screwing up." Then they send it to an expert to fix. There needs to be someone somewhere who is an expert. One probably can not be an expert on everything, but a wise person will know his limitations. The people who do not cause a lot of grief to themselves & others. If you are drawn to a specific area & want to learn more, then that is the path to follow. You can not put a pricetag on that spark. Just because someone else laid out a course of study, which might meet the average person's needs... surely does not mean that we all should follow it. The trick is to be smart about it & get the right credentials & such to have creditability.

Wanna learn to shoe horses???? It's hard, but if'n your good you make good money. I can teach you.

I have put too much blood and sweat into these damn trucks so I'm gonna continue doing it till I make a breakthrough Or I run out of blood. If I could figure calculus out I would be golden. I have some books that have incredibly fancy formulas for tons of engine calculations that I can't even read. Written in greek as are all of math formulas for whatever reason. Interesting how every greek letter seemingly, stands for a number that isn't exact. Pi, phi, e, etc. irrational numbers. I did find out that I could probably still get all the books I want because my sister goes here. She did really good in HS and took weighted classes so she is basically getting a 4 year degree in 3 years. They say engineering majors always take more like 5. Hopefully it works out for her. Hers is business management degree.

Wanna learn to shoe horses???? It's hard, but if'n your good you make good money. I can teach you.

Very true! 12 years of a bad farrier left us with an almost crippled horse. Finally got one that is getting her to come around, 2 years and counting. Lots of farriers out there, and alot of crippled horses for life due to the ones that think they're good, but really aren't. Get good at helping the bad ones you'll have lots of work

Very true! 12 years of a bad farrier left us with an almost crippled horse. Finally got one that is getting her to come around, 2 years and counting. Lots of farriers out there, and alot of crippled horses for life due to the ones that think they're good, but really aren't. Get good at helping the bad ones you'll have lots of work

In the recent past, I've had clients (still have the clients) that have had horses on the short list for both the PanAm Games and the Olympic Tryouts. Crazy politics involved in those venues though...........as my clients found out in short order. Great midwest horses are not allowed to place over or win over fair East coast horses!!!

I have put too much blood and sweat into these damn trucks so I'm gonna continue doing it till I make a breakthrough Or I run out of blood. If I could figure calculus out I would be golden. I have some books that have incredibly fancy formulas for tons of engine calculations that I can't even read. Written in greek as are all of math formulas for whatever reason. Interesting how every greek letter seemingly, stands for a number that isn't exact. Pi, phi, e, etc. irrational numbers. I did find out that I could probably still get all the books I want because my sister goes here. She did really good in HS and took weighted classes so she is basically getting a 4 year degree in 3 years. They say engineering majors always take more like 5. Hopefully it works out for her. Hers is business management degree.

ISX. You are a smart guy. You are very independent. You are a hard worker. I really hope your health issues get worked out, those sure can be expensive in many ways. School can too. And its frustrating that you see inefficiency and waste in your textbooks, classes, other students, and professors. I felt that way too, both as a civilian and in the military world. Thankfully, i tend to not see that sort of thing in the oilfield as much. Calc is different... but worth understanding. Its a foundational part of everything that will be done later. I urge you to focus on one thing. You have to do whats best for youreself. You are smart enough to realize that you have to live for yourself and that in our society we place a lot of value on that piece of paper. Your goals are similar to what mine were when I wanted to be an engineer. I wanted to build things. I thought mechanical engineers built things after learning all about mechanical design and whatnot... Turns out, that that sort of thing is mainly done by design engineering managers at best, and really, most of it is done on computer and through an iterative process that can be quite boring because of the small scope of most jobs. Most guys don't even get more than engineering studies while they learn the ropes right out of school. Don't get me wrong though! Engineering can be really really fun! I really enjoy my job as a Fracturing Engineer and I get to make things happen with my engineering mind that makes oil and gas wells produce better. My point here is that I think like an engineer and I have the basic skills. Those basic fundamental calc/physics/math skills are what got my foot in the door. After that, I got the necessary certs, skills, and experience to make myself an expert in my niche in the oil business. Now, I sell that experience. I understand ops and I sell my specialist skills consulting on special topics and my ops plus engineering skills are essential. I guess I get the feeling you are frustrated with the process. The process may suck, but its the process that society has. Some classes really suck. If its best for what you want to do in life, get that degree! It will open doors in jobs that will give you the chance to really do some real engineering and project management. School can also be frustrating. And you may have to evaluate the resources, time, etc you have, and do what it takes to meet your goals. I struggled through Algebra and Calc I. I failed economics. I really struggled in Chemistry. I only made it through those first two years with lots and lots of work and support from family and help from the professors that were willing to help and the free tutoring centers at school. Be aware that you may not get that cool job in an R&D shop at Caterpillar out of college. You may get an offer at Pratt & Whitney or GE working on control systems for turbine engines or wind turbines. But, that sort of thing can be quite fun and rewarding in its own right, and you can get into that technology way deeper than diesels, and still play with trucks with your new found skills and tools at that point. Good Luck ISX. None of this was ment to be condecending at all, and I hope it comes off as helpful and encouraging.

much advancement in a big company/corporation revolves around the "it's who you know/blow" thing. Something I've never been a part of. I call a "spade a spade" and don't look back..........because it's the truth.Be true to yourself ISX. Make yourself happy and don't worry about what Ma and Pa think.

Yeah I hate chemistry. I swear the chemical names are made up, though they say they are made from "rules"...I haven't found the rules to make any sense. You guys really have me driven into economy topics and stuff. I didn't learn any of it in school for some reason and have a huge interest in it now. My precalc teacher is just flying through everything carelessly and when I ask how formulas were derived I get beat down. I have a hard time living with "it's that way because that's how it is" so I try and find the history of things so I can better understand them and it always works out in a way that doesn't help me through the class because of the time I spent researching. I realize there are opportunities to be had. The Boeing guy is always at school running around same with GE and other people. If I kept going I would have a aeropspace minor as well. It would be a 5 yearish process. It isn't so much the time as it is the use of the time. I'm not sure if it's just me or what but I see so much wasted time it makes me want to puke. I do no have a TV, I research and learn things all day long. I have spreadsheets open all over the place, injection pump parts all over the place. I don't have a couch or anything in here, I have more parts to things haha. My mom also told me yesterday that she thinks I'm autistic. Then she went to her room and got a 1000 page book on autism out that she was 3/4 of the way through because she is so sure I have it. I love helping you guys out better than everyone else can, why else would I be trying to get a pic up as fast as possible. I have spent probably $500 on stuff to help me understand this crap and of course I try and share what I figure out with you all. I have this theory that if everyone stopped doing repetitive crap, we would all have much more innovative things. And there is nothing more repetitive than seeing the same questions on 10 different forums that are asked 10 times a day. I want to make it so a question is asked anywhere in the world, it is answered in FULL, and that is that. I mean if we didn't spend so much time wondering why the temp gauge sways so much, we would have been working on optimal pop pressure and other things to get efficient power. I don't believe you need more fuel to make more power (and air to match)...I believe more power can be had by simply increasing efficiency. So to me it isn't "what injectors should I get", its more "what should I set my pop pressure on my stock injectors at?" and how can I make the turbo spool better and stop loafing around at low RPM. I enjoy going to college. I mean any time you can learn something is a good time. I'm just not sure I couldn't be a lot further in "life" if I just went through the library at my own leisure. Engineers have a lot of advantages in that they get to "see" very neat things that make their brains tick a little differently. There are some days I go to the library and flip through a book looking at all the pictures. The pictures give you ideas that you never thought of before. New ways to measure something (like the PITA cams) and many other things. There is a show and they are all on youtube now called Engineering Connections by Richard Hammond (the top gear guy). They are the best because they show the damn history which is EXACTLY what I want so he sees things the same way I do. I will learn calculus because I need to so badly. Then I can program excel to do it for me There are so many things in this world that just seem hidden to the average person and I have never seen any fancy calculations on any forums so it would be neat to have them all worked out and make them understandable by everyone. I don't believe anything is "hard" I always think things are just worded wrong. It's like me saying the injector pop pressure is 260 bar instead of the pressure is 260 atmospheres. Most people know the atmosphere is 14.7ish (apparently a bar is 14.5psi now) so you can easily say, ok 260 x 14.7..... then you get something you know how to do. You guys wanna do something REALLLLLLY neat that I think ties a lot of the ease of math together that teachers seems to ignore...logarithms.... Check this crap out. Basically a logarithm is finding the exponent or "power" a number has to be raised to in order to get a given number. So 10^x = 100. So x is 2... 10x10=100. Alright, simple... well you can also multiply very easily like that. I am going to cheat a lot and use numbers with multiples of the same base. So 512 x 2048.... using 2 as the base you find the log base 2 of 512 and get 9 because 2^9=512. Same thing with 2048 and you get 11. So 9 + 11 = 20. Yeah, you just did 512x2048 by adding 9 and 11.......................Meaning 2^20=the answer (1048576). That was cheating a LOT, usually you get decimals but still, I find it very neat Oh and if you subtract you are dividing. Any nth root can also be found just as easily. No I didn't learn this at school haha. But I just see a very peculiar thing going on here that teachers seem to skip over rather quickly. Now you all can buy bigger hats. Don't ask how you get the log of numbers and ruin all my fun. Though that in itself is also fun.

Hey man.I think your just too clever and you get bored easily. You also have multiple interests.Problem with college/uni is it makes you choose 1 track. You can choose different courses but you have to choose a major.Most people I know with degrees - including me - no longer work in their original field. So one thing is not to view it as if your a chemical major thats all you will ever be. Most people change careers totally at least 1 time in their life.So anyway - hard to say man - but your interested in challenges and intertested in diesel. Why not get heavily into building transmissions or heavily into injector builds. If you get good enough at it - you will make good money and have a decent pay working for yourself. You will also be able to help people on forums with detailed specific knoweldge rather than just good guesswork. Finally - when/if you decide to chaneg careers (become an structural engineer or banker or whatever) you will have those skills (problem solving) and helping people through an open dialouge for life :)And you can always fall back to it or keep it as a side $$ generator