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Josh’s Quotes #17

[16-24] Early on in the internship, I ended up getting sick and I had to go home. I ended up being out for a week with flu like symptoms. Then, I came back to work and I started to pick up and it was easier to do what I needed to do. Then, my grandmother passed away, which was a minor setback in the work place. I had to leave for a day to come home and take care of that. Then once I got back to work, I didn’t really have anything else going on. That learning curve was also starting to, like I said, level out. Work started to get easier and I started to enjoy it a lot more of the time. Not to say I didn’t enjoy it before, but it definitely, like I said, at points was frustrating. Then as the job got easier, I enjoyed it more.

[191-207] The learning curve began to level out because I kind of figuring out little tips and tricks. Just doing it, taught me how to do it. I don’t want to say I was very quick to go ask for help. Because I would look at a problem and I would try to fix it myself before I would ask and bother someone else and waste their time. But my mentors and co-workers were always there to help me when I needed it. If not right away, within 15, 20 minutes. I leaned on them, they came and helped me. Every time something went wrong, I’d fix it and then maybe a few days later I’d get the same problem and I’d be like, “I remember how to fix this now.” Everything started coming together.

It came together for me in two ways. The first way is that, obviously you have a powerhouse. I’m sure you can imagine there’re hundreds, thousands if not millions of components in that structure. There are a lot of parts to learn. As I’m learning more parts of the powerhouse, and I’m understanding the parts, it makes it easier for me to design it because I know what I’m looking for at the end. That came together, but also learning how to use the systems where we store drawings. Learning how to make a bill of materials. As I started to see how the systems integrated into each other, I was like, “Okay, because I’m putting this in this system, then it can show up here so that this department can know that they have to do X, Y, and Z.” It was all of those things kind of together and not one really outweighed the other. They all kind of just kind of worked at the same pace to get me to the point where I was.

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Josh’s Quotes #18

[67-77] Another aspect where I had to adjust to while working at the company was the 3D modeling software. At school, for reference, the 3D modeling software that we use is called SolidWorks. This company uses Solid Edge. It’s the same concept, different application, different buttons, pretty much how everything else is on a computer. But at first I had to learn that, which was not that difficult. But as I had mentioned before, the difficulty kind of came when I had to learn all of their specific systems. In the sense that, they have a system where they store all of their finalized drawings. I had to learn how to go in there, how to make a drawing and there are certain steps. You have to have certain things set right when you create the document. It has to be a certain type of document. Once you’re done with it, you have to make sure it has a certain name based on what it is for what project. Then you have to promote it to somebody. Then once they approve it, then someone else has to approve it. Then you have to, I think, release it one more time. There was a lot there.

[78-87] Then there was another program called SAP, which is kind of where all the intricate things came in. If you have a drawing with something that you build, you have all of these individual components that go into it. SAP is where you store all of the bill of materials for these components. Again, you have to make a bill of materials, you have to fill in certain things. They have certain call-outs for specific parts. Whether it’s because it’s like a bolt or a nut, or it’s because it’s in a certain part of the powerhouse. Learning all those short names, learning the process so I don’t mess it up or so that there’s less to fix later. Then the same as the other thing, someone else has to check it. I have to update it and then release it and go through all those steps. Learning those systems I think was the most difficult aspect of the internship. I did end up having difficulties with Solid Edge. But it wasn’t necessarily with learning Solid Edge itself, I think it was more so the specific project I was working on.

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Josh’s Quotes #19

[88-100] I think I had difficulty with Solid Edge because it was probably the biggest project I think I’ve worked on in my time. I was given a drawing that was made in 2000 of what’s called a discharge ring. It’s a roughly 140-inch diameter ring that goes out at the bottom of the turbine as the water is discharged, hence the name. I had to model the whole thing. Without getting too intricate, the way it was modeled has to follow a guideline by the company. Of course, this is in an effort to make it more standardized and make it easier for people to look back on what was done moving forward. Because I had to do it a certain way, it took a little longer. Then, when there were issues, I would have to lean on my co-workers to help me.

The company actually assigned me a mentor. I meet with him weekly to discuss anything I’m working on, any questions I have. He usually tells me a few things just in general about powerhouses. He’s like, “I remembered this thing that happened, and I wanted to share it with you.” I can go to him anytime.Then, we also have certain people in the office who are, it’s called key users. One of my co-workers was the key user for Solid Edge. He was the person who taught me how to use it, led me to the tutorials that I had to complete. Then when I had questions, he was most of the time, the person I went to.

[134-157] I should clarify, the discharge ring […] When I say design project, I mean in the sense that I have creative input into how it is designed. With the discharge ring, I was given a drawing and they said, “It’s got to be the same, so make it.” Then I had to use the existing drawing to make a drawing with the right dimensions. But with the design project, one of the types of turbines has blades that can rotate. Inside the hub of the blades there are links that move with the motor to cause the rotation. In assemblies, these links themselves can weigh about 200 pounds. The problem becomes, what you have to do is you have the shaft that the blade is on and then you have a shaft that you have to connect the links with. Basically, you put the pin through the links and then you have to set the links somewhere so that you can put the next pin through. Because they’re obviously pretty heavy, you can’t just hold them with your hand. We don’t want to let them just rest on the parts because they could cause damage and it’s a very tight tolerance. What we need is something that can hold the links up. What was already in process was the design for what they call the link holder. Where it takes two holes that bolt in on the outside of the hub. Then, it’s basically shaped like an L and you have a stud of sorts coming out of it to […] It’s just a screw, a soft screw so that it doesn’t maybe dent the metal on the link, and then the link just sits on it. I mean, I can talk about it more. There’s a lot more to it. But basically, I was given the design that we had, I was given a list of concerns and what to do about them. I was given also some specific things like, “We need this to be changed to this.” Then I came up with some ideas on how to change it.

After talking to my co-worker who gave me the project and then going to his supervisor who the project is for, they both liked the idea and they said I could roll with it. Along the way, they helped me with the actual modeling and figuring out how I could make what I wanted to make, and giving me tips. If I have my design, they said, “Well, we really liked this design. Here’s something that we’d like you to roll with, with your design and tell us how it turns out.”

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Josh’s Quotes #20

[162-182] Unfortunately, we were getting towards the final stages of modeling right when I had to go home because of COVID-19. Basically, what we had done is, I want to say, counting from the first design I was given, I think there were probably one, two, three, maybe four more designs before we landed on the final design. Some of them were my designs, some of them were my co-workers design. But a lot of it was, we sat down together, and we said, “Would this be a good idea? Yes or no, maybe. Let’s try it.”

I made what’s called an involute profile, which is usually the profile of a gear tooth. To do that, it takes some complicated geometry and it’s not something that I could do by hand, it’s not something you can calculate. It took us a while to figure out how to do this because we were basically designing a gear from scratch. A lot of complex curves and faces and we weren’t really sure where to go. It took about two or three weeks to get that figured out. I should add, this wasn’t a priority project, so it didn’t get a lot of time. I had a lot of projects they were giving me and said, “We need this this week.” This is what’s called modularization, so it’s desired to make our lives easier. But after the design, like I said, we were coming close to finishing the modeling. We had figured out, “All right, this model is good. Everything should work the way we wanted it to. Let’s double check a few things and then we can start putting it on a drawing.”

Then once we have a drawing, we send it out to a company that’s going manufacture it for us and send it right to us. Like I said, unfortunately we didn’t get to actually finish it. But the co-worker that I was working with it on, I’m close to and he did tell me, we had a conversation before I left and I told him, I said, “If you guys figure out what you need here and you’re going to finish it, just do it. Don’t wait for me because I don’t know when I’ll be back.” But they did express their thanks with the project. It felt like my input was appreciated and my time.

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Josh’s Quotes #21

[468-495] For the most part, I had positive experiences with the people at work. However, I also worked with an individual who wasn’t as helpful as others. For the discharge ring, I worked with, not a lead engineer, but I think he’s an engineer too. But he’s a lot older than me. He’s probably in his late 50s. He might even be 60. I’m not sure. But that’s very different than talking to my mentor who’s five years older than me. There are times when I was doing that, like when I was modeling this discharge ring, I kept running into problems because I didn’t know the software. I wasn’t sure if I was doing this math right or something, and I would go to him. Sometimes I’d go to him and most of the time he’d be like, “Just do this and that.” It was very easy said and done. But sometimes I would say something and he’s like, “It’s pretty simple. You just got to figure it out.” It was times like that where I got frustrated because I’m like, “Well, I’m kind of asking for help. I don’t think I’d ask if I didn’t need it. It’s obviously not that simple.” But that’s one thing. Like I said, that wasn’t all the time. It was just sometimes.

But then I did have interactions with my mentor. There were a lot of other people that were around that age that were hired around the same time. When talking to them, it’s a lot more nonchalant. They sit down and they want to have a conversation with me as well as do the work or tell me what I need to do. We have Skype for Business in the office. I can send them a message or I can walk to their desk or I can send them an email. But I mean, sometimes we have a conversation on Skype. I might text them and be like, “How do I do this?” They’ll tell me and then they’ll say something and maybe I’ll make a joke and we’ll have a back and forth while we’re working. I don’t know. But it varied a lot. I had both ends of the spectrum. I had, “You’re a kid. I’m an adult. Let’s be sure that you’re the intern here.” Not in a sense I felt like, “Man, I got to get out of here.” Just I was like, “All right, you just got to stick up your butt and I’m just going to do my job anyway.” But I had that end and I had the end of the spectrum where the people were willing to be patient and learn with me.

There were some things where we had a problem and I was able to figure it out. Or I found something in Solid Edge for example. There was a shortcut button. I don’t remember what it did, but I found it and I started using it. The keys user for Solid Edge was like, “I didn’t even know you could do that.” He’s like, “That’s really interesting.” He’s like, “I’m going to remember that.” A lot of spectrums, I guess, crossed in the interactions with my co-workers.

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Josh’s Quotes #22

[500-526] When I experienced difficulties with the lead engineer, at first, I would kind of just go back to my desk, look at it again, and then I’d have to go to a different co-worker. Because if I can’t figure it out and I got to get it done, and I have to do something. I would tell him, I’d be like, “Yeah, I asked him this and this is what he said.” They would give me … If they could, they’d say, “Well, let’s try this and see if that works.” Or they would go and ask him themselves after they tried it and they couldn’t fix it. That happened.

But we had another project, I was working with the same guy and it was the same powerhouse. It’s a part that’s attached to the discharge ring, but a different model, a different drawing. I was looking at the drawing he gave me and I made a model and then I made a drawing, and the dimensions didn’t match up. Yet when I checked it, everything should have been correct. Then I found that there were […] I kept trying to change the models. I changed a lot of things and then I sat down and I did the math again. I realized that there were dimensions on the drawing that either the way they were rounded or the way they were put on the drawing, they conflicted. They weren’t possible dimensions to make what was on the drawing. In that case, when I started having issues, I didn’t want to go to him right away because I knew I was probably going to get a, “Figure it out.”

I went to my co-worker and he looked at it and I told him, I was like, “I’m not going to go to him first. I want to make sure this is wrong before I say something.” He took a look at it himself. I did those calculations. I took a lot of pictures exactly where the problems were. I just went up to him and I started to tell him, I was like, “Look, I’m …” I kind of mentioned it before and I had gotten the like, “Use this dimension.” He told me, “Use this dimension and it’ll work out.” Now that it didn’t, I told him, I was like, “I’m still having trouble with this.” He’s like, “Well, you just got to look at the drawing and make sure the …” I don’t know exactly what he said. But basically, the thing that I didn’t want to hear. I kind of said, I was like, “I tried that, but actually I found this.” Then I told him and showed him what I found. Then he was like, “Let me take a look at it.” In 30 minutes, he was like, “Just do this instead.” Thinking back, it’s just a waste of time. I don’t think I […] I shouldn’t probably have to have those interactions. I shouldn’t have to make a case just to ask a question. But most of my co-workers I could just go to and they would fix it right away or help me right away. But with him I had to really make my case and double check that I wasn’t incorrect when I went to go ask him my questions.

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Josh’s Quotes #23

[25-41] Prior to COVID, I went to a conference, I think it about a month ago now, for a weekend. This was my first time. Then after that, that week was when my school decided to close campus. We have the option to request to stay. I didn’t request it because I had some stuff at home to take care of and they were closing everything on campus. Which means I wouldn’t have anywhere to go for food and there’s no library if I want to go, anything like that. I decided that I was going to […] I guess I should have mentioned, they closed for two weeks. That was the original plan. That they were going to close campus for two weeks. I said, I’ll take two weeks and then I’ll come back. I made the request so that I would be able to come back on March 31st, the current at the time date. I came home and then the next week the governor decided to shut down everything. That meant I couldn’t go back to school. In the past week and a half, two weeks, however long it’s been since then, the school, they first extended the shutdown through the 14th of April. Then they have now extended it indefinitely through the end of the spring semester.

[300-310] Given the nature of the issues, I lean on my family a lot. Like I said, when I got sick, I came home, I laid on my couch all day for a week because that’s all I could do. My family was nice enough to take care of me and give me what I needed to feel better. Then of course, grandmother passed away, so I went home. Now that I can’t be at school working, I’m at home. My family has really been, I guess, the contact point there. Of course, I mean, I do talk to my friends a lot at school or the friends that I still have from home. I keep daily conversations with them. That was also helpful. Another thing is, since I don’t have schoolwork to do in the evenings and on the weekends, it gives me time to focus on when I want to go to the gym. It also gives me time to go on hikes, something that I enjoy doing. That was also helpful to clear my head in those times when maybe my family was busy and I needed to do something for myself.

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Josh’s Quotes #24

[396-421] Although I had an internship this semester, I originally planned to participate in student senate, but I found out that my work schedule would put me coming home right when the meetings were starting every week. I have a position that needs to be there at least 30 to 45 minutes before the meeting. I decided to step down because I could’ve made it work. I could have asked my friends to cover for me and they offered to cover for me before I even asked them. But I felt that the position should be given to somebody who has the time to put in, because they’re going to be more passionate and they’re going to be a better asset to the team.

Even though I didn’t do that though, I still know everyone in the organization pretty much. I’ve gone to a few of their events. I showed up to their meeting one day when I got off of work a little early and I stayed in touch with them. But they are also kind of in cooperation with our campus activities board. I have continued my involvement with them. I still do their … You have to work an event every month. Which isn’t a problem because I usually do the trivia night, which is Friday, around 8:00. It’s way after work, I can still do what I need to do and then enjoy my evening. I did that. I’m trying to think if there was anything else. I mean, I still talk to the alumni department. I’m not part of that organization anymore, but I still support it, I guess as a third party. If that’s the correct way to phrase it.

I mentioned in one interview that I was a part of a thing called road crew. I wasn’t in that this year because I had my internship and I had to be available for that. But their last stop was in downtown near the school where I was living and it was right when everybody came back to school. I went there and I was able to talk to all my friends and support the organization and support my school. We have what’s called the Day of Giving. Where it’s how the college makes its money because our college is not for profit. I participated in that by donating some money, which is typically something that they ask people who are in the organization or have been in the organization. I donated and did a few other things. I showed up to an event across campus one day just to support them and say, “I’m here.” I have even begun talking to them about coming back to the organization next year when I have more time. I don’t think there’s anything else though. I think those are the only things that I’ve been able to maintain with the time that I had leftover in my day.

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Josh’s Quotes #25

[427-444] I’m only registered for two credits for my internship. But I think they still consider me a full time student because I still have my apartment and I’m still a housing contract and I can do all the things that […] I can be in these organizations even though I’m not a full-time student. But obviously very little interaction with faculty especially comparatively, but just in general. But I did get to see them a few times, just happenstance. I had to have my packages sent to the engineering building because of the mail room hours. There were a few times where I stopped in to grab a package at the end of the workday and they were just heading out for the end of their day. I said hi and that was it.

But specifically, to the internship, part of our internships is having a faculty advisor assigned to us. They have to come to the site and they have some questions that they ask me. They have some questions that they ask my supervisor. “How is your college doing? How is the intern doing? Would you have them back? Would you come back?” All that stuff. Then I have to make a poster at the end of the year or the end of the semester, basically talking about my work. Then the supervisor has to take a survey about me. When my faculty advisor reached out to me, I had communication with him and my work advisor, we figured out a day. He came and I have a personal relationship with this professor as well. There were a few emails otherwise. When COVID came out, I was asking him about the state of things, what to expect, how to move forward and stuff like that. Other than that, there has not been interaction with my professors other than the sparse email here and there about senior projects and other stuff coming up.

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Josh’s Quotes #26

[448-462] I don’t really talk that much to other students just because a lot of them aren’t on campus. But my roommate’s an engineer. We talk about work, but we don’t really necessarily talk about what we do. We talk more about the social interactions that we’re having. In my opinion, it seems like he’s not doing the level of work that I would expect from an internship given the experiences I’ve had. It kind of just seems like busy work to me sometimes, not all the time. We talk about that. We talk about what we’re doing and we’re like, “This is stupid.” Or, “This is fun.” Then I do have a few other friends. Like the student that I’m going to be living with this coming year, I’ve talked to him every now and then. He messaged me the other week and he was freaking out. He’s like, “Oh my God.” He’s like, “I designed this part and I ordered this tubing, but I thought it was this tubing.” He’s like, “I got really lucky because it was still correct.” It was a long conversation I’m trying to just shove into a few seconds. But he tells me about his projects. He tells me what he’s working on. He asked me what I’m doing, and we also talk about the coming summer and the coming fall. We had to figure out our roommate situation and all that. But that pretty much I’d say it would describe most of the interaction with my peers. Other than the day to day, I see them walking to the gym or at the dining hall.

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