Ive got a question for all the engineers on the site (and I assume there are a lot of them) How often do you use advanced calculus stuff day to day? Im in a mechanical engineering cirriculum, and in Calc 2, and I keep asking myself, "will I ever use this?" So Im asking...How often do you use it. I mean stuff like limits, derivitives, intergrals, etc. Thanks...

You will use it in more of your classes. Just wait till Dynamics, Thermo, etc. As for real world engineering practices I cant say b/c Im still a student but I would think so.

Im in engineering also, and i mean the programs we're using such as matlab i hear dont ever get used in real life situations. but some of those dynamics and thermo like brian said might be more practical. vairking let me know how mechanical engineering is going, im thinking of doing that next year, because I want to get into working on cars. later

Keep in mind fellas. It's not the actual equasion you will need, but the knowledge of when to apply an equasion, then you can just look it up.

I am not an engineer. But a business degree requires a lot of mathematical applications.

I remember those days...not a lot of fun.

I've since changed majors to business as it help me more with my career.

All my friends that have graduated with engineering degrees all have nice computer programs and books to look things up when they need to. They say they never really use it, but knowing how it works is the key.

well, it depends. i just graduated in may from PSU in civil engineering, and ive been working as a field engineer for a consultant in northern NJ, and in the field, you dont need anything that you learned in school; even in the higher up positions, some of them dont have college degrees. while i was in school taking classes for my major, like civil engineering classes, i didnt really use calculus too much. after youre shown calculus, they beat you to death with it your first 2 years, then after that, they show you all the short cuts around it.

on the other hand, in the spring time, im moving into the office in manhattan (woo hoo, i cant f*cking wait) to start doing some design work. im sure ill have to use some of the stuff i learned in school but i highly doubt calculus (computer programs do all the nasty stuff.)

on the other hand, it depends on what type of engineering you are going into. 2 of my roommates in college were mechanical, and they used calculus and differential equations everyday in school, until the day they graduated.

to sum this all up, it depends on what type of engineering youre going into, and it depends on what kind of professors you get. you might professors like mine that did the dance around calculus but graded really hard on the correct "other way" to do things. my roommates had teachers that preached calculus and graded unbelieveably hard on it. or you can switch your major to hotel and restaurant management, like my other roommate who went out drinking about 5-6 nights a week, on average ;)

dont worry about not retaining any of that crap after school - the real engineering world (generally speaking) doesnt push calculus too much.

if any of you guys have any questions though, id be happy to answer some of them (or try to) for you. it might be good to ask me while you can, since i just graduated, and i can tell you what its really like. just so you know, im a civil engineer, i had 2 roommates that were mechanical engineers, and one of my best friends that i grew up with is an electrical engineer somewhere in the middle of the desert in arizona, so i have access to a lot of resources for you. i wish 2 years ago i knew someone who had just graduated as an engineer. if i knew 6 months ago what i know now, id be in school right now getting my masters; instead i gotta do it the bigger "pain in the ass way" - night school starting next summer and going for 2-3 years at some sh*tty school. yorue better off doing it all at once and getting your masters from a good school while you can, cuz once youre out, and you get a job, odds are, you wont be near anything good. (i.e.: im moving to long island in the spring, and theres nowhere on long island that offers engineering masters programs except for like, 2 schools.)

good luck guys, and get licensed, otherwise youre throwing away 20% of your potential pay.

I just graduated in May with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and I know exactly how you feel. The answer is yes, and no. You will need the skills you learn in Calculus in your later classes to an extent. Nearly every equation you'll learn and use in Theromdynamics, Dynamics, Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics, etc are all derived using Calculus. Now you won't have to go and derive all the equations yourself (if your professors are nice), but it does help you to understand where the equations came from and how to use them if you understand the Calculus behind them. All those Calculus classes build a good foundation for you.

Once you get on the job, you'll probably never need to take a derivative, or an integral, or write a partial differential equation describing a system (you'll get there--it's nasty). It does depend on the job somewhat. You may use more of what you learned in school if you wind up in a research and development type job. If you take a job like I have (process manufacturing, project management), you won't use as much. Stick it out; it does get better.

Originally posted by CoryL


All my friends that have graduated with engineering degrees all have nice computer programs and books to look things up when they need to. They say they never really use it, but knowing how it works is the key.

oh, i also wanted to touch on this. one thing i learned after i got out of school is that anyone in the world can do any job (i work with plenty of morons with no education or common sense who are project managers with a lot of responsibility.) the thing that makes you different is that you know why things happen and how they happen because of your education. anyone can sit in an office and punch numbers into a program and the program will tell them how to design something, but youll actually know what the program is doing, and why certain things end up being what the computer says. believe it or not, those computer programs make A LOT of mistakes, and those "morons" i work with just know how to say "thats what the computer told me."

i just thought some of you younger guys might like to know that. i didnt understand the worth of my education until i graduated and had to work with people who have no education. keep in mind, an eduaction doesnt make you the authority on everything and anything - dont be an arrogant 22 year old on a jobsite. also keep in mind that some dumb bastard who has 30 years experience isnt always right either, just because he has 30 years of experience; he'll just know that concrete cures because the "water dries out" (which, coincidentally, is NOT how concrete cures), but hes clueless about the complexity of the concrete curing process.

ok, im done rambling for now. geez, i really gotta work on summarizing my sh*t up more ;)

hehe..............Mechanical Engineers........what a bunch of overpaid idiots!

NOT ANY OF YOU GUYS!!!!!

Just every single one of them I work with everyday! Ryan, the HVAC MEs I worked with couldn't spell Calculus, much less know what the heck to do with it. All they do is put what they know (from architects) into a big fancy program and hope it works. Then they start second guessing what the computer states, THEN THE REAL FUN BEGINS! Then when it doesn't work, they expect guys like me to just "make it work." What a bunch of idiots!

Robb

BTW: Like I said, this is just personal experience from dealing with the HVAC MEs I work with.

I finished mech eng in may and so far have used little of what I learned, most of the calculations are done with computer programs but it is good to be able to look at what the computer throws out and know if it is right or you missed a decimal place when you were typing it in (yeah I've done this). If you don't have the background then you have no way of knowing if the computer is giving the right info.

One other thing is please at some time work on the floor, most of the young guys I work with have never done this and specify tolerances that are not needed at all and don't consider how much more it will cost to make.

Im in engineering right now....i want to get a co op or internship at one of the big automakers...but im not sure if I want to work with cars the rest of my life. Right now I'm set on mechanical engineering and we're doing this bs program called matlab, which is so ridiculous. Tbaum, you think mech would be appropriate for cars? perhaps engine design?

oh and BTW, why we gotta rip on the hospitality majors...its their choice...:p

Originally posted by espnfreak
Im in engineering right now....i want to get a co op or internship at one of the big automakers...but im not sure if I want to work with cars the rest of my life. Right now I'm set on mechanical engineering and we're doing this bs program called matlab, which is so ridiculous.

Bwahaha! I did two summer internships at BorgWarner in NY, and that's ALL I used: MATLAB. Don't knock it. It's the most kickass piece of science/math/engineering software out there. If you're smart and get an advanced job at a REAL engineering firm you will probably use it, or the guy one cube over will be using it when you get there.

I was writing software in MATLAB - to simulate variable cam timing systems - that solved a dozen or so simultaneous differential equations, so yes you do get to use the math you learned. But more importantly, studying all that math teaches you an analytical and problem-solving mode of thinking that's VERY helpful in engineering design and analysis. My brain works totally differently now than before I became an engineer, and totally differently from non-engineers/scientists. I'm not saying better, or smarter, just different, and I like it.

....geeesh....and I am complaining to my wife about the trig class I had last semester and now the physics.....lol.:eek:

Originally posted by espnfreak
Im in engineering right now....i want to get a co op or internship at one of the big automakers...but im not sure if I want to work with cars the rest of my life. Right now I'm set on mechanical engineering and we're doing this bs program called matlab, which is so ridiculous. Tbaum, you think mech would be appropriate for cars? perhaps engine design?

oh and BTW, why we gotta rip on the hospitality majors...its their choice...:p

Ouch! MatLab for ME's? I don't think that should be used for anyone except for EE's or CPE's, but then again about 1/4 of us EE's knew how to use it when I graduated in May.

At Miss. State, most other Engineering majors used MathCad. While very buggy, I think that it is much easier to use since it doesn't require basic programming experience.

i used matlab and mathcad. i didnt really do much with them, i had to use them in my required comp sci course. the course was for C++ and C, but they touched on matlab and mathcad.

You got away with only Matlab? While I was in school (I graduated in May) I went through Matlab, Maple, TKSolver, and a little bit of MathCad too I think. But I have to say none of them were nearly as much fun as Maple, while it can do absolutely anything if you kick it hard enough, its renowned for crashing and eating your file when you try to print it out and hand it in.

As far as how much I use advanced math at work or any of those programs, very little. But being able to understand all of that stuff they teach you in school based on that math is very, very useful. Now most of what I'm doing at work involves a piece of software called ANSYS, a finite elements modeling program that makes all of the math programs look simple.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention I'm an ME grad from WPI.

Cartman has a very important point. You have to be able to when your computer simulation is giving you bogus results. When I started my current job, I was developing a specialized fluid dynamics code for a 120mm tank cannon (2-phase flow + combustion, fun!). I had to use much of the calc I learned in school, plus some additional stuff from reference books. Now I use other software for ballistics simulations, and some FEA software for stress analysis. Your use of calculus and other skills from college will depend on your job, but you need to uderstand the fundamentals.

-Todd
B.S. AeroE - University at Buffalo (Go Bulls!)
M.S. AeroE - Iowa State (Go Cyclones!)

I've never seen Matlab, but I have done my fair share of C++ programming in my Numerical Methods and Dynamic Systems classes. We used mostly MathCAD and Excel. MathCAD is buggy and eats resources but it is a powerful program. It always gave me hell when I needed to use units. It was finicky, but with a little convincing, I could make the result look like it was supposed to.

Actually, I forgot that I did use a little Mathematica when I took Cal 3-4 & DE I, but those the only times that I used something other than Matlab. For most of my Power courses, I needed only Excel, Matlab or my TI-89, and it was mainly my TI or Excel. Matlab was really for the extreme stuff. Pspice was mainly for simulating circuits.

If you want to know something amazing, our IE department doesn't use any math software, just Excel and their simulation software.