You know your an old draughtsman when...

[Geoffers]

This thread is wonderfully nostalgic.

 

White drawing overalls... OMG 30 years ago +...I wore a white lab coat type overall at work. After a few days off ill, but first into work, I climbed a little deleriously to the 3rd floor garret and my dimly lit office - to see 'myself' in white lab coat already hunched over the drawing board. After double-take I pushed at 'myself' who slowly fell over into pieces; cardboard drawing tube and paper body parts only loosely held together with drafting tape inside my lab coat. Oh how we laughed when colleagues turned up some minutes later!

[Jack_O'neill]

Geoffers,

 

Your comments remind me of a little ditty I saw on the bulletin board many years ago...

 

Attention all employees...it has come to our attention that employees dying on the job are failing to fall down. This practice must stop as it has become impossible to distinguish between death and the normal movement of the staff. Henceforth, any employee found dead in an upright position will be dropped from the payroll. Thanks and have a nice day!!

 

Someone actually posted this on company letterhead. HR was of course furious, but no one ever owned up to it.

[Susan-Skye]

This is awesome! And perhaps, not quite as 'ancient' as some of you people claim- or is it that I'm just old-fashioned?

 

I'm only 28, but I know about 80% of what you all are talking about! My grandfather was a chemical engineer at Union Carbide in Texas, and when I majored in drafting in High School we started out with pencil, paper, eraser shields and drafting boards with self-healing mats- and I used ALL of my grandfather's old equipment! We still have his antique adjustable drafting table, and I STILL use his plastic templates and his special pencil with its combo stand/sharpener!

 

And you know, given the choice between pencil and vellum and the latest and greatest software... I believe I actually prefer the "old-fashioned" way...

[Susan-Skye]

And yes, I remember tape-balls.... once, at the end of drafting class I walked back to the other side of the room from the CAD area, only to find that all of my things had been well and thoroughly TAPED to the drafting table at which I'd been sitting- huge gobs and wads of it, sticking all over the place! LOL! I've never looked at masking tape quite the same way!

[Bill Tillman]

And does anyone remember Dry Cleaners...a bag full of eraser material which was like sprinkling sand all over your drawing to keep the triangles, your arms and hands from smearing the graphite. And I heard the part about smoking was allowed. There always seemed to be some guy in the engineering room who had to smoke a pipe and the room was filled with vanilla smelling tobacco.

[Eurodude]

Yep The days when windows was made of glass with wood around the edges - there was no such thing as political rectitude (think Calendars) and the only bloke with a carbon footprint was Santa Clause

 

I got this email a while ago, Maybe not AutoCAD museum, well I guess it had to start somewhere! All before my time but I'm sure some of you might find it relevant!

 

You know you are an old Draughtsman when............................

You know how to control line weights by rolling your pencil.

You know that a French curve isn't a grade change on a language exam.

You've erased sepias with chemicals.

You've had a roll of toilet paper on your drafting board.

You remember when templates were plastic and not a type of electronic

file.

You know what sandpaper on a stick is for.

You know that compasses draw circles and are not used to find the

North Pole.

You remember the head rush from the smell of ammonia.

You own a roll of masking tape so dried out, it will never be tape

again.

You've done cut and paste with scissors and sticky back.

You've etched your initials into your tools.

You have had a brush tied to your drafting board.

You've come home with black sleeves.

You've made hooks out of paper clips to attach to your lamp.

You know an eraser shield isn't a Norton program.

You've used "fixative" spray.

You've had a middle-finger callous harder than bone.

You have a permanent spine curvature from bending over your table.

You could also smoke in the office

You could put the 'page 3' calendar up in a prime location with no one

complaining

There were a lot of 'cowboys' about but now it's all Indians

The Evening News printed the words "Piping Designers wanted" on a

Wednesday

Agents didn't sound like spotty kids

You'd change jobs for an extra 50c

You'd have a set of blunt razor blades but not for shaving

You'd have the 'taste' of an old white rubber on your tongue

You'd be able to speak to the engineers in English

There'd be more than one way to sneak back into the office after lunch

You'd actually do a time sheet on a Friday

You learnt to fold an A0 drawing to get the title on the front

You'd have to be nice to the print room staff

You had to find new ways of persuading the stationary bloke to give

you a pencil

The old Doris in the office looked like she was 'chewing a wasp'

There were NO old draughtsmen

You also were accurate from 100 paces with an elastic band.

Your personal phone calls were in front of the chief draughtsman.

You went to the pub most lunchtimes.

Friday afternoons were spent colouring in.

There was an office junior.

Everybody hated the same person.

The chief draughtsman wore overalls with ink stains on the pocket.

And your timesheet bore no relevance to the hours you had worked!! (Well....something's don't change!!!)

[Eurodude]

Now that I think of it them were'days when draffies did their laughing charts and lying charts (timesheets and Xs) after the pub on a Friday and they tittered rather than twittered.

[eyde]

OH I know this well. I have another twist, I was the only female out of about 10 at my first job. In fact the only other female was the girl who answered the phone.

[Teeds]

I've got halfheimers ...

 

Did anyone mention ruling pens, crow quill pens and linen? I started drafting in 1964 and have not quit since. The medium has changed, as has the method of input, but the goal is the same ... communication.

 

As the quote in my sig says ...

[SLW210]

I have no recollection of any of this.

[BlackBox]

I have no recollection of any of this.

 

Me either ... of course at my first Civil Engineering job I used AutoCAD LT 2004, and setup on-site Trimble GPS base stations, control points, heavy equipment rigs (i.e., bulldozers, graders, excavators, etc.) and modeled our sites in 3D to be saved to tiny, little data cards for the aforementioned GPS site equipment, LoL

[Tyke]

I have no recollection of any of this.

 

WHAT and here was me thinking how modern it all was . We used rods, poles and perches when we did our chain surveys and updated rolled up mine plans that were started in 1812.

[Dana W]

WHAT and here was me thinking how modern it all was . We used rods, poles and perches when we did our chain surveys and updated rolled up mine plans that were started in 1812.

 

Rods? Poles? Perches? how was the fishin'? Chains? We used a long length of Mammoth tendon with rocks every five rarghs's

[BlackBox]

Rods? Poles? Perches? how was the fishin'? Chains? We used a long length of Mammoth tendon with rocks every five rarghs's

 

lmfao

[foxbyrd31]

here here! I am only 29 and know about 80% of the "old fashioned" stuff! I am not very quick with a pencil and a scale, but I definitely find beauty in a well crafted hand drawing. I was also glad to see when looking over the work put forth from students of my alma mater that freshmen and sophmores still draft by hand. There is certainly something to be learned by doing something the "hard" way! Sigh after all the nostalgia I have to add "brush up on my hand drafting" to my 'to do' list!

[Stryker1989]

Well considering I'm only 22 this makes me feel old, guess back in South Africa they were old school about technical Drawing

[Tyke]

@Stryker: Old school in SA? You should have seen them on Allensway in Thornaby

[CyberAngel]

... you seriously considered entering the field because of an ad in a comic book.

 

[resullins]

Hey, it's getting to the point where if you ever even drafted on an actual drafting table you're old. I was a GREAT hand drafter... I almost miss it until that carpal tunnel in my left wrist flares up.

[SLW210]

Did anyone ever get that "High Pay Job in Drafting"?