Mechanically inclined?

[Twitch]

Ok that's the question- are you mechanically inclined? Not to the point where you can build additions to your house or rebuild your car's engine, but are you half way compitent with hand tools to tinker with repairing something?

My Dad taught me nothing cause he knew nothing so I taught myself to be familiar with tools and basic mechanics. Learned a lot by trial and error working on cars but never got comfortable working with wood.

 

[Miss Neecerie]

I would say I am.

Perhaps not to the knows everything about power tools level.

But I can strip wood, refinish.
Wire lighting fixtures
some basic plumbing
paint things
etc...

Growing up in an all female household, where we often didnt have money to just 'call someone'....means we did it all ourselves really. So I learned all this very young.....mum is scared of electricity so I learned that while she did plumbing....

 

[Paisley]

I won the egg drop design competition in engineering school. Nowadays, I just fix stuff around my house.

 

[Feraud]

Ok that's the question- are you mechanically inclined? Not to the point where you can build additions to your house or rebuild your car's engine, but are you half way compitent with hand tools to tinker with repairing something?

My Dad taught me nothing cause he knew nothing so I taught myself to be familiar with tools and basic mechanics. Learned a lot by trial and error working on cars but never got comfortable working with wood.

I am pretty good with tools. While not a carpenter or electrician, I know which tools are right for the job.

 

[Maj.Nick Danger]

I'm pretty handy. I was a machinist for 15 years. I'm good with retrofitting and modifying, areas where I don't have to follow directions but get to create my own solutions to problems.

 

[Rafter]

I would say I am.
Perhaps not to the knows everything about power tools level.
But I can strip wood, refinish.
Wire lighting fixtures
some basic plumbing
paint things
etc...

OK Miss Neecerie, you're hired. But ya gotta change those shoes!

My grandfather was a draftsman by trade, so the whole power tool thing is in my blood.

I once took a date to Home Depot, just to see if she shared the same passion for home improvement. She wanted to hit me over the head with one of the 2x4's!lol

 

[Miss Neecerie]

OK, you're hired!! But ya gotta change those shoes, Neecie.

No way....I once laid bricks in flip flops...including passing them up from the bank of a river by tossing them to the next person in the line....nothing hit the feet.

Granted...it was Brazil, and it was too hot to wear even tropical weight combat boots...

mmm I had tan lines on my feet for months after that

 

[Zig2k143]

I'm lucky if I can hang a mirror straight.... But I can pull out my card and hire the people who can do the job.

 

[Johnnysan]

Luckily, my dad was good about passing knowledge on the same way he acquired it...by making me work alongside him. My first love (a '74 Chevy Camaro RS) demanded that I become a shade tree mechanic...up to and including a complete engine rebuild. In my younger days, I worked in maintenance at a local hospital and the college I attended. As a result, I picked up the basics of carpentry, electrical work, plumbing and HVAC.

Some years ago, my wife and I were involved with the local Habit for Humanity chapter and I learned how to build a house from the ground up. I ended up as the procurement officer for a couple of projects. That helped me to figure out in a hurry what materials and labor cost and has helped me to avoid getting ripped off at home.

Thirteen years ago my wife and I bought a 120+ year-old Victorian home which has called on the full application of my accumulated knowledge! :eusa_doh:

So, yes...I am mechanically inclined, but mostly as a matter of necessity!

 

[BeBopBaby]

My husband and I put new plumbing in our house. After the pipes under our kitchen sink blew and we found out there were no shut off valves under any of the sinks in our house (all part of the joy of buying a 100 year old house), we had to take the old pipes out under all of our sinks and put in new pipes with shut-off valves. Having had no prior plumbing knowledge, does that count?

I do have one word of advice though... never stand directly under pipes that you are soldering overhead. Molten solder really hurts when it drips on you. lol It's not the higher-level mechanical problems that gets me, it's the common sense stuff that gets me every time!

 

[LizzieMaine]

I grew up without a father around to run to every time my bike needed to be fixed or my roller skates oiled, or whatever, so I learned early on to do that kind of stuff myself -- then when I was a teenager, my uncle taught me how to run theatre projectors so he could get a break from it once in a while. Then I grew up and went into radio and was surrounded by equipment that was held together by duct tape and gum wrappers and we all needed to know how to do basic maintenance on it.

The result is that I'm quite adept with very specific sorts of mechanical things -- but when it comes to working with wood or running power tools or anything like that, forget it. Just yesterday I cut off the top of one of my knuckles with a box cutter, so I'd be terrified of what I could do to myself with a chain saw.

 

[Doctor Strange]

I have no automotive or woodworking knowledge/experience at all, and I have tremendous respect for folks who can do that kind of stuff!

But I can do minor electrical work (like changing switches and installing fixtures) and a little plumbing (like changing toilet ballcocks) - the kind of stuff you learn when you're a homeowner. And I'm a whiz with some rapidly vanishing old-school disciplines like b/w darkroom work, handling 16mm movie film, etc.

 

[Sunny]

I'm not sure I'm mechanically inclined. I've learned how to use various tools, but I don't have much need or opportunity to apply the knowedge. What I do have is manual dexterity and an innate spatial awareness.

My hands and fingers are very skilled, likely from years of both piano playing and complicating handsewing. Additionally, I am left handed, and by necessity have acquired more dexterity with the "wrong" hand than I would in a left-handed world.

The spatial awareness is harder to explain; I've got three examples. When something breaks or comes loose, anything from a cassette player to a bicycle, I can usually figure it out without wasting too much time. It's just not hard to see what needs unscrewed or where a particular part has to go. Or when packing, like cramming reenacting stuff into the back of an SUV with the utmost neatness and efficient use of space. I can just tell what will fit where most efficiently. I can look at a "hole" between the stuff and the window and pick something that, with a little nudging, fits in perfectly. My eyes and brain can just do that measuring. Or when making a left turn or merging into traffic. One half-second glance, and I've measured how close and how fast the closest car is and whether I can go or not. All three of these abilities I used to think everyone had, but further experience has shown the contrary.

I have used a chainsaw once, and an axe - both a real axe and a wood-splitter - on multiple occasions. If I really wanted to I could learn how to weld, but my father and brother are taking care of that project just fine right now.

 

[Maj.Nick Danger]

I'm not sure I'm mechanically inclined. I've learned how to use various tools, but I don't have much need or opportunity to apply the knowedge. What I do have is manual dexterity and an innate spatial awareness.

My hands and fingers are very skilled, likely from years of both piano playing and complicating handsewing. Additionally, I am left handed, and by necessity have acquired more dexterity with the "wrong" hand than I would in a left-handed world.

The spatial awareness is harder to explain; I've got three examples. When something breaks or comes loose, anything from a cassette player to a bicycle, I can usually figure it out without wasting too much time. It's just not hard to see what needs unscrewed or where a particular part has to go. Or when packing, like cramming reenacting stuff into the back of an SUV with the utmost neatness and efficient use of space. I can just tell what will fit where most efficiently. I can look at a "hole" between the stuff and the window and pick something that, with a little nudging, fits in perfectly. My eyes and brain can just do that measuring. Or when making a left turn or merging into traffic. One half-second glance, and I've measured how close and how fast the closest car is and whether I can go or not. All three of these abilities I used to think everyone had, but further experience has shown the contrary.

I have used a chainsaw once, and an axe - both a real axe and a wood-splitter - on multiple occasions. If I really wanted to I could learn how to weld, but my father and brother are taking care of that project just fine right now.

Sounds like you are very right-brained. You would no doubt be very good at artistic endeavors. (Welding is easy.)

 

[jamespowers]

I am inclined call my mechanic. Does that count?
Seriously, having cars that are all over 30m years old, living in a 20s house and loving old stuff tends to foster a need for mechanical accuity. Nuh said. :eusa_doh:

 

[Tommy Fedora]

I had to become Mr. Fixit when I bought my house. I can do a lot of repairs although I prefer not to.
I once got the top off a ketchup bottle that was on REALLY tight. lol

 

[BegintheBeguine]

Who knows where I got this gift?

My family and in-laws are breakers, not fixers. Somehow I can take apart and repair vacuum cleaners, commodes (including public ones), sewing machines, lawnmowers , VCRs and other things that go poof. I also repair broken video and audio tapes like a champ. People have always given me digital watches (remember those?) to program, even strangers! lol

 

[Diamondback]

Just yesterday I cut off the top of one of my knuckles with a box cutter, so I'd be terrified of what I could do to myself with a chain saw.

Ouch. Much sympathy from this ol' rattler--I almost whacked a fingertip off once...

And re "mechanically inclined", does being more at ease with the company of machines than people count?

 

[Sunny]

Sounds like you are very right-brained. You would no doubt be very good at artistic endeavors. (Welding is easy.)

That's what people tell me... and then I have to admit that I can't draw worth a hoot. I can't even doodle! When I was bored in class I'd write quotes or witty/sarcastic comments in my margins, and sometimes make up complicated Middle-earth riddles.

(It had better be! I haven't watched because we've only got one mask and one other pair of goggles. But if my dad's trusting my brother with it, it'd better not be too hard. He's a great guy, but of all six of us, considered the Most Likely to Break Things. )

 

[Jay]

Changing the oil on friends cars as well as my own-Check

Constructing chests and trunks to hold things without prior woodshop experience at the age of 13-Check

Working every other week as a paper hanger/house painter-Check

Constructing bookshelves and a desk-Check

Replacing starter motor in my car-Check

Buying an old seized-up Royal Portable typewriter from an antique store and have it working within 3 hours-Check

Trash picking a moped and fabricating an air filter-Check

Brazing a hole shut in an old dairy bucket-Check

Changing a tire, Spackle-ing holes in walls, restoring old Schwinn bicycles, hat-bashing, all of it. And I can cook, clean, and my singing voice sounds just like Johnny Cash.

I guess I'm mechanical.