Engineering Magazines

In ye olde days, 1325 AD to be more precise, an engineer was defined as “a constructor of military engines”. Back then engineering was divided into two categories: Military Engineering and Civil Engineering. The former involved the construction of fortifications and military engines, the latter concerned non-military projects, for example bridge building. This definition is now obsolete, as engineering has broadened to include a myriad of disciplines.

The exact origin of the word ‘engineering’ comes from the era when humans applied themselves to skilful inventions. Man evolving further in the world invented devices such as the pulley, the wheel and levers. The word engineer has its root in the word engine, which comes from the Latin word ingenium, which means “innate quality particularly of mental power”. And thus the word engineer emerged as a person who creates nifty and practical inventions.

Today an engineer is described as someone who has acquired and is applying their scientific and technical knowledge to designing, analysing and building useful, helpful and functional works. This would involve structures, machines and apparatus, manufacturing processes as well as forecasting their behaviour in particular environmental conditions. This is all accomplished with functionality, operational economics and safety to life and property forefront in mind.

Engineering is a broad discipline with many subdisciplines dedicated to various fields of study with regards to particular types of technologies or products.

Engineers may begin their career being trained in a specific discipline, but because of the engineering jobs they take-on, they often become multi-disciplined having worked in a variety of different fields.

The field of engineering has traditionally been divided into the following engineering job categories:

- Aerospace Engineering

- Chemical Engineering

- Civil Engineering

- Electrical Engineering and,

- Mechanical Engineering.

However, since the human race has been swiftly advancing with regards to technology, new branches of engineering are being developed. Engineering jobs can now also be found in the following fields:

* Computer Engineering,

* Software Engineering,

* Nanotechnology,

* Molecular Engineering,

* Mechatronics and many more!

Although all these fields may be defined differently, there is generally a great overlap, particularly in the fields of physics, chemistry and mathematics.

Engineering jobs usually entail applying physics and mathematics to problems in order to discover viable solutions or to make improvements. Where a number of different solutions are available, engineers evaluate these options and the required outcome in order to identify the best route to follow.

The earliest recorded civil engineer was an Egyptian known as Imhotep. It is believed that Imhotep designed and built the great pyramid of Djoser, also known as the Step Pyramid. Imhotep was one of Pharaoh Djoser’s officials and it is possible that he was the first person to make use of columns in architecture. The Step Pyramid was built in Egypt in about the time period 2630 – 2611 BC and can be found at Saqqara.

Imhotep would probably be absolutely fascinated with the leaps and bounds engineering has taken in the last 4000 years – although he might have a few secrets to share himself!

I am going to start this article with an obvious cliché that says that the car is one of the most important and useful inventions of all times by far, in the whole history of humankind.

Yet, getting over this aspect of the problem we land on this: how important is the maintenance to a car (owner). This is a very suitable question because there are many people that would rather buy an expensive car and not to make those indispensable maintenance changes that simply have to be done at some point, or simply there are people that do not take care of their cars but only when they do not seem to work at all anymore.

Yet, no matter if we are discussing about a car as a personal asset, a car as a public transportation mean it is suggested to avoid different difficulties that may appear when owning a car.

Try not to be one of those owners rather indifferent to their cars that simply start the car, drive and then park it. Not knowing what may be wrong with your car or how it works it makes it impossible to maintain it in a perfect condition.

Do not think of keeping your car in a perfect condition as another way to lose money – think of if you keep it in a perfect condition you will get to sell the car at a great price in a few years.

Think if you really afford not to pay the attention, you should to your car, and go for learning how to take care of it. Even if you do not know basic things about cars such as how to do a rudimentary check of your car engine, or how to check your engine oil level, the spark plug change (if it may be the case) or even the windscreen wiper change it does mean you have to worry.

All these can be learnt very easily and the Internet is full useful advice on this subject. Another important thing you should learn (if you do not already know, of course) is how to take care of your car during winter months when winter tires are required and sometimes even chains. I have listed below a few basics when it comes to owning and maintaining a car.

First of all, you will need to know how to buy a new car, what values you should look for and how to spot possible problems. This will take just a few hours because all you have to do is check car guides and see a few aspects and their meaning.

Second, assuming you do not want to buy a new car, or simply want to buy a used one too, you should know how to buy a used car and not be scammed. This way you will know how to sell it yourself in the future and obtain a good price for it.

Third, you will need to prepare some kind of a schedule based on which you will do a routine check-up. This will avoid any serious problems in the future.

Fourth, something very important is to how to change a tire because there are many people who simply do now know what to do.

And last, but not least you will need to know when the battery is flat and how you can either replace it or recharge it.

Of course, aside from these, there are a few other general aspects that you should note, but these will give you a great start.