I'd go one further and say you have to be at least a journeyman in whatever tools your process is using.
The difference between someone designing a part in cad and someone designing the tool paths for the machine that makes the part in cam is night and day.
We could discuss this at length, but I completely share your point of view. Anyone can design a part that's impossible to produce.
The real added value is knowing how something is actually going to be made, in how many stages, with what tools, what controls will be carried out, with what tools, what the acceptance and rejection criteria are, and how these criteria have been determined, are essential points.
> The difference between someone designing a part in cad and someone designing the tool paths for the machine that makes the part in cam is night and day.
I remember, in a CNC programming class, the instructor calling out one of the students on a lathe program: "One millimeter increments?! What material do you think you are using? Styrofoam?!".
That class is where I feel in love with the ASR-33 teletype and its cadenced hum. It was punching the tapes we feed into the CNC machines. I wish I could have bought that machine when it was retired not too long after my class.
> "One millimeter increments?! What material do you think you are using? Styrofoam?!"
I'm an EE not a MechE but I'd be truly curious to know if there are any MechE programs where a fresh graduate would have ever heard the term "feeds & speeds".
In a similar vein, I learned to solder in EE but not because of any of my course work. We were lucky enough to have an aerospace electronics manufacturer situated on the north edge of campus. The IEEE Student Society worked out a deal with them where EE students who wanted to learn could come and do a 3-hour crash course with the techs. I could solder before I did the course, but my ability to solder well improved dramatically as a result of those 3 hours of training. And, even more importantly than learning to solder, I learned a ton of things about solderability: what makes a circuit board easy to solder and what makes it hard to solder under different manual and automated manufacturing techniques (wave soldering, paste + pick & place, etc).
>I'd be truly curious to know if there are any MechE programs where a fresh graduate would have ever heard the term "feeds & speeds".
Germany has dual degrees where you both learn a trade and get a degree. If you are doing this for Mechanical Engineering you definitely will learn this.
Degree programs also have required internships and there are definitely courses which you can take during your degree. I would be surprised if there weren't a majority of mech eng graduates who would know the basics of milling.
My brother, who graduated 2024 in MechE is aware of the term “feeds & speeds”.
Mechanical engineering is a pretty broad discipline covering everything from micro fluidics to structural requirements of sky scrapers. It’s a good skill to have but I’m not sure that awareness of operating a milling machine is critical for success after graduation.
> if there are any MechE programs where a fresh graduate would have ever heard the term "feeds & speeds".
This was an extracurricular activity, and the MechE's were in their fifth year or so. I was in my first year (semester, really) and I was suggested I take the course because I was already a reasonable programmer and there was very little materials in the course, but it was more about programming the machines (simple loops, no real decisions, etc).
I was doing 0.1mm increments in my code because I "felt" steel wouldn't be soft enough for more, but I never got any real training on that before second year.
For a while, we had the "maker movement" and "maker spaces", and people were learning that stuff. But that all tanked when TechShop went bankrupt.
There are still maker spaces around, but most of them are now more into sewing, paper folding, and hot glue than CNC machining. Few go beyond a 3D printer.
The ones that do tend to have some kind of subsidy from a larger educational institution.
What about using simulation(or estimation using software) to understand the manufacturing process well enough to design for it, without being in the factory?
Simulation is a tool. Determining whether the results of a simulation are consistent and valid requires a great deal of experience.
Almost anyone can use fluid mechanics simulation software and obtain beautiful multicolor images. Only an expert will be able to determine whether they're worth anything, and when it's time to run a mock-up to validate calculations.
Simulation can help train new engineers, helping them to understand complex physical phenomena, but it cannot replace field experience.
The organization of the production site, the employees and the quality culture are an integral part of the production tool, and cannot be simulated.
The difference between someone designing a part in cad and someone designing the tool paths for the machine that makes the part in cam is night and day.