Common Sense

As you all know,Iam basically a mechanical engineer,having served in engg industries for more than 40 solid years and supposed to know basics and fundamentals on mechanical and electrical applications.

I also used to teach on the subjects and shown practical applications .to no of people related to the engg industries and other industries as well.
When i took up new jobs like on textiles,foundry,cold forming,dyeing,training,purchase,management,plating,tanneries,trading and Leather goods manufacturing,i used common sense applications and did my job to the highest level earning very good name from top management .That was the reason,coys hired me till 65 yrs .

ENGINEERING IS NOTHING BUT APPLICATION OF COMMON SENSE

Most of the people have commonsense while very few have presence of mind and apply when it comes to trouble shooting / problem solving .Some times the mind goes blank and does not trigger to operate in right direction to sole problems spontaneously .I too solved no of issues by applying such techniques and on some occasions also failed miserably to identify where the problem is and resolve .It is very simple and basics.Before attending to such problems, if we ask WHY WHY QUESTIONS, iam sure there will be a solution, but one must ask WHY WHY questions as many times as needed and till we get the answer .

1- Recently during Dasara festival at my home we had water leakage in the drain pipe problem in washing machine, Amma called the service mechanic quite a no of times and he did not turn up to the calls.So i got a new hose thinking,there was a crack / damage in the pipe due to long use and thought to solve by replacing with.I fixed the new one which was too long and started the m/c,still it was leaking and by the time i was observing,the mechanic also came and saw the hose was tied to a higher level ( due to too long,had to tie up ) preventing gravity flow and thus leaking water at the joints..The mechanic sharply noticed this and put the hose straight and saw no leakage.The mechanic looked at me smiling and i had to bow my head being an engineer
My son was also looking at me.I was feeling very bad due to absence of my mind at that time.This is very basic and fundamental which did not strike me at all at that time .We face such things in life quite often if we have such attitude .

2- Electrical -- Our house outside light was not burning for quite some time.The electrician came and attended to the fault by cutting the wire and refixed it, the bulb was glowing for some time.After he had left,i thought it my be due to loose contact / line connection problem which can be attended only by the elec man. So i asked Dayalan elec man to attend,but he had failed to come and attend for the first day.I wanted to change the bulb and see, hence,i changed bulb which i was having and checked the filament in naked eye
.I took it as ok and put and observed that the bulb was not blowing.I thought there must be some problem in the line and again called his father to send a person.who came immediately and observed that the bulb was fused, shown me,the filament was cut actually .He asked for a bulb from the regular line and when changed with that bulb,it was glowing .Wonderful.I had to manage the show by telling some stories and escaped by giving Rs 10 for the job.He was smiling and left cool looking at me .He knows me as an engineer ( common sense man )
I think people must be experiencing similar occasions and we should not feel bad about and really when such issues arise,look at the problem,have some patience to look at and look at where and attend to by analysing and questioning why why.Most of the problems are of simple in nature and if we go step by step ( process approach ) by applying basics and fundamentals,we are sure to come out of the problems .
I had similar experiences during working in TVS also where the workmen used to test us in finding out our knowledge / pulse and process of solving and the time taken to resolve such issues and rate us and call with pet names like ZERO ,Makku,Pista ,Dabal batcha etc
This is applicable to all types of industries / offices including IT