It's time to boycott college

[brimic]

My Dad did Sprinkler Fitting which is similar.  Installing fire protection.  He is retired now. 

My Dad did die making/maintenance and machining.
He retired at 62. (last year)
He goes fishing every day now.

[French G.]

It is actually called Manurite.  It is high temperature metal that operates at up to 1700 F (for us at least).  The tubes are welded to a header which is welded together until it gets out to some refractory lined pipe and then a waste heat boiler.  (Steam Methane Reformer)

Very interesting. Essentially inconel, monel, hasteloy or whatever you want to call your trademark. A high nickel superalloy. Welds with inconel filler. Addition of niobium is what makes the alloy particularly good for high temp applications. Learn something everyday. I also learned that based on the several thousand dollar cost per foot of pipe you'd be dealing with that it is no wonder they run off bad welders.

Stuff is fun to weld when it is new. Problem is that most of the inconel alloys I encountered were not new because they were broken. Mostly hot section engine parts. Nothing like welding something that has heat cycled a few thousand times and has cracks you don't even know about yet.

[charby]

What might be a good plan is to move college loans back to private only and bring back the bankruptcy protection.  Bank might be more careful who they give money to.  It might also force universities to cut fees a little. 
 I think it is at least 3 times more expensive now.  However, I have run across A&M graduates from out of state who told me out-of-state tuition was still cheaper than their local major universities. 

15 years ago, most of the budget at state schools came from the state and from the federal government, since 1999 this portion from the State and feds has been shrinking where many universities funding sources are less than 50% from their state, some are as low as 40%. The loss of revenue has to come from somewhere, so tuition is increased to cover part of it. Sounds like more free market to me and less government involvement to. No one makes people go to post secondary school and forces them to get a degree that doesn't pay well in the real world.

[Ron]

The market distortion comes from government loans to students who otherwise couldn't get a loan.

The schools and government are in cahoots.

[Balog]

15 years ago, most of the budget at state schools came from the state and from the federal government, since 1999 this portion from the State and feds has been shrinking where many universities funding sources are less than 50% from their state, some are as low as 40%. The loss of revenue has to come from somewhere, so tuition is increased to cover part of it. Sounds like more free market to me and less government involvement to. No one makes people go to post secondary school and forces them to get a degree that doesn't pay well in the real world.

Fed.gov backed student loans with no chance of default.

[MechAg94]

Very interesting. Essentially inconel, monel, hasteloy or whatever you want to call your trademark. A high nickel superalloy. Welds with inconel filler. Addition of niobium is what makes the alloy particularly good for high temp applications. Learn something everyday. I also learned that based on the several thousand dollar cost per foot of pipe you'd be dealing with that it is no wonder they run off bad welders.

Stuff is fun to weld when it is new. Problem is that most of the inconel alloys I encountered were not new because they were broken. Mostly hot section engine parts. Nothing like welding something that has heat cycled a few thousand times and has cracks you don't even know about yet.

Most of the welding is done on new metal.  The thicker header pipe is the only part that is used.  We have to replace some of the furnace tubes periodically.

[roo_ster]

15 years ago, most of the budget at state schools came from the state and from the federal government, since 1999 this portion from the State and feds has been shrinking where many universities funding sources are less than 50% from their state, some are as low as 40%. The loss of revenue has to come from somewhere, so tuition is increased to cover part of it. Sounds like more free market to me and less government involvement to. No one makes people go to post secondary school and forces them to get a degree that doesn't pay well in the real world.

Over that time, post-sec administrative positions have multiplied at state schools.  To the point that in some state university systems, administrators & bureaucritters outnumber instructors.  And they are subsidizing worthless departments.  Cut the multitude of useless mouths at the trough and see some real educational efficiency blossom.

Also, You assume less state funding, but are plying percentile games.  For example, if the state maintains its level of funding, but the university raises tuition, the percentage of total funding from the state goes down.  Without cutting a single dollar going from the taxpayers to the state university system.  There is no "loss of revenue."

This happened here when the legislature lifted restrictions of tuition increases.  "Oh the noze, the state is SLASHING post-secondary education funding!!!!111!!!"  No, the state schools just drastically increased tuition and went on building and hiring splurges.

[Balog]

Iconel is also used in a lot of the better suppressors for the baffles. Welding inconel to titanium seems like it'd be tricky.

[charby]

Fed.gov backed student loans with no chance of default.

Those have been around for decades, since 1965. That was long before tuition was increased faster than inflation.

[RoadKingLarry]

I thought intelligence tests were not legal but skills tests were if administered universally to all applicants?

When I applied with my current employer I had to take a 2 part test. First part was basic mechanical and simple electrical knowledge second part was more advanced electronics that included basic calculations using formulas for ohms law, and inductive  and capacitive circuits as well as some basic computer logic diagrams where you had to determine the output state of various gates by a given input. After 14+ years actually sort of using that knowledge it was a simple test to me and by the look on the he test proctor's face when he scored it I did some better than average. They wouldn't tell us our actual score.
Sadly,  knowing that some of my co-workers took and passed that same test tells me the passing score wasn't very high.

There were 4 of us that hired into the same work group and started on the same day. 3 of us were veterans and had 10-14 years in a related field. The 4th guy was a very recent graduate from a local vo-tech adult program. Good guy, sharp and a hard worker but he was constantly bitching about 3 of us starting at a higher step on the pay scale.  He was convinced it was because he was black.

[charby]

I thought intelligence tests were not legal but skills tests were if administered universally to all applicants?

I'm currently applying for a state job in another state and I had to take a simple test to get to a second test before I can even submit my application material.

[Boomhauer]

When I applied with my current employer I had to take a 2 part test. First part was basic mechanical and simple electrical knowledge second part was more advanced electronics that included basic calculations using formulas for ohms law, and inductive  and capacitive circuits as well as some basic computer logic diagrams where you had to determine the output state of various gates by a given input. After 14+ years actually sort of using that knowledge it was a simple test to me and by the look on the he test proctor's face when he scored it I did some better than average. They wouldn't tell us our actual score.
Sadly,  knowing that some of my co-workers took and passed that same test tells me the passing score wasn't very high.

There were 4 of us that hired into the same work group and started on the same day. 3 of us were veterans and had 10-14 years in a related field. The 4th guy was a very recent graduate from a local vo-tech adult program. Good guy, sharp and a hard worker but he was constantly bitching about 3 of us starting at a higher step on the pay scale.  He was convinced it was because he was black.

When I was interviewing at the shop part of the process was taking a mechanical aptitude test.

Very basic, such as showing a picture of gears and asking which way indicated gears turned, showing a balance bar with loads on each end and asking where the fulcrum placement would be most effective, etc. Similar stuff to what is on the military ASVAB. No math.

I scored an 89. I was told the average score was 62.