What is your forte?

**Ross** · #21 02/27/10, 06:17 AM

Quote:

What was the deleted post for?

Because for some reason my post went in twice.

Riverdale · #22 02/27/10, 02:11 PM

Industrial maintenance, electrical, electronics, welding, hydralics and pnematics. Most of the time we run around fixing what the monkeys break.

My fabrication skills leave something to be desired for looks, but will stop a tank.

rancher1913 · #23 02/27/10, 03:30 PM

where to start---- I'm a licensed master plumber, a licensed universal backflow tech, a licensed universal hvac tech, a licensed electrician, a licensed contractor, and have a degree in construction managment. have lots of skills and am paid very well for them. my family has been farming and ranching since 1913 but I did not get along with my uncle that was in charge of the family ranch so I learned construction and when he had run the place into the ground I bought him out and took over the ranch. good thing I had skills to make a living as the ranch has been a money pit to get going again.

Danaus29 · #24 02/27/10, 06:57 PM

I'm best at deconstruction.

Don't make any money at it and mostly self taught. We've been tearing up 2 houses.

travis91 · #25 02/27/10, 07:53 PM

hmm.. not sure what mine is im still learning. I think i have to be the youngest on this site.. i am currently going to school to get my A&P license(Airframe and Power plant), pretty much you can work on any part of a aircraft except electronics. I'm really enjoying it so far so maybe that will be mine.

arcticow · #26 02/27/10, 08:15 PM

I learned what skills I have on the job... I can work with any sort of livestock and do most health-related things necessary. Enough carpentry from building and repairing on the farm to be better than fair. IF I can get a shop manual, I can work on most farm equipment, but am no mechanic. I can and have done landscape work. Driven enough miles on a bus to wear me out, any truck that a Class B can cover, I can drive. Learned the feed and hay business the hard way, from the warehouse up. Still just a kid, and learn something every day!

tinknal · #27 02/27/10, 11:30 PM

Demolition. I like it and I'm good at it. I love to knock down a block or concrete wall and make it so the whole thing comes down with one final blow.

Blu3duk · #28 02/28/10, 12:55 AM

I grew up on a small 240 acre farm, so i understand a whole lot more than i sometimes let on in life, in Feb 1986 my dad and i bought a portable sawmill and my forte is knowing exactly what any given log will cut out in usable lumber and what the best way to saw it on the mill is.... that knowledge and a dollar will get me a cup of coffee at the local eatery yet [only a quarter at the truckstop though if i bring my own cup]

I have made money in various types of industry over the years being a GOAT [Generalist Of All Trades] and am fastly approaching the OLD GOAT status so i am told by my oldest son..... age 9 [btw his grounding is up in 2 years over that one, 47 aint old its just numerically challenged] I do well with buildings, from stick frame to full scribe log dwellings, start to finish, and even have handled being a system admin for the local internet, which I can now include "miracle worker" on my resume for some of the computers i had to deal with doing tech service for them......

However my second forte is probably research, for those that dont know i held my own in the court for quite some time, and even impressed a few pettyfogging shysters who work for places like JP Morgan..... they still won, but only cause the Idaho Supreme Court did a tap dance on my paperwork and i just tossed in the towel after so many years.... i earned all the grey hair i have now.... tis why i have went back to prospecting and metal refining...... what i get is mine..... and the knowledge cant be taken away.

William
Idaho

Forerunner · #29 02/28/10, 08:54 AM

I know I don't post in here much, but this topic caught my attention.

I was raised by a schoolteacher who had been raised on the traditional 80 acre American subsistence/dairy farm. Grandpa had a dozen or so Jerseys and Brown Swiss.

Dad raised us on a residual 6 acres of the original family holdings, with a variety of the old farmstead activities dabbled in, but not enough for him to make a living. I am eternally grateful for his singling me out (the oldest son) for a much more stringent role in keeping the farm working than what was required of my brothers.
The was wood to cut, animals to tend, gardens to manage, meat to render (Dad is from German stock, and sausage making is his height of sentimental joy), buildings to dismantle for our lumber supply, bees to keep after, etc.
I remember that we were always a bit handicapped in the power and tooling departments. For that reason, industrial arts class was a real eye-opener for me.
Just so happens that the instructor was really good friends with Dad, and so I had somewhat of an easier time of it, but not so much the first few years.
Mr. Clark was a tough old bird.
I thoroughly enjoyed the drafting and woodworking classes the first couple years, but it was the matalworking and journeyman classes of my last two years of high school that set the sage for my future. That and the fact that I was, by that time, cleaning horse stalls and tending the ranch maintenance needs for a neighboring thoroughbred farm.
I got to watch the horseshoer work.....

Welding and all manner of blacksmith work really did it for me, and going to horseshoeing school shortly after graduating high school was as close as I could come to training in those arts, at least within the confines of what was available to me at the time.
Several years, multiple hard knocks AND well-managed opportunities later, I put a down payment on my 15 acres......and bought an old Case 580 hoe to carve the place into a suitable fashion. I had already been dabbling in the salvage metals, and it wasn't long before excavating, demolition and salvage, with the occasional horseshoeing job thrown in, became my living, full time.
Running machinery came naturally enough to me.
Spending 12 hours bent over a cutting torch paid made many a payment toward land and more equipment.....and, in later years, building my own equipment in the shop became my hobby of passion. I had come full circle from my upbringing, and had the tools and equipment to overcome most of the frustrations that hounded my father in his day.

I don't know that I've enough head knowledge to guide anyone through much of a project, but those that come spend a day or so with me as I engage in one always seem to come away from the experience with a better understanding.