Paisneil,
Our friend “Mainwheel” is obviously of the Airframe/Engine persuasion. If you are successful in your interview and are subsequently employed with Qantas, you will find a lot of this type of (good natured) rivalry between the Airframe and the Avionics trades.
Rest assured however, a lobotomy (notice that he couldn’t even spell it correctly) will only be required if all of the Avionics positions are filled and they can only offer you a position as an Airframe Engineer.
It is generally accepted that the Avionics trade requires a candidate of a higher level of intelligence. When I went through the recruitment process, a higher psychometric test result was required to be accepted as an Avionics Engineer than was required for the other trades. I assume that this is still the case.
The career you are about to embark upon can be a very rewarding one. Don’t be disheartened by your Airframe brothers who will call you a “Cone Head” or a “Queer Trader”. They are a justifiably frustrated lot. While they slave away all day, dragging heavy components to and from the aircraft and wallowing in fluids with nasty odours and questionable long-term health effects, they see you with your head buried in a wiring diagram, seeming to achieve nothing for hours.
You see, the concept of troubleshooting is somewhat foreign to some of our airframe brethren. They are accustomed to defects that they can see. There is an old saying that “the average airframe defect takes five minutes to find and four hours to fix. The average avionics defect takes four hours to find and five minutes to fix”.
Despite all this, most of our brothers are happy with their lot. Only a few will openly admit that they “ticked the wrong box”. Most will argue that “the aircraft will fly fine without an autopilot. Let’s see how it goes without an engine or elevator”. Good point… However, in these modern times of fly-by-wire and FADEC, “our” systems are controlling “their” components. I’m not saying for a moment that they are a redundant breed. They are VITAL, just like each member of the orchestra is vital to the conductor. Heaven forbid that we should have to do all of that heavy lifting ourselves! We must retain the services of our airframe brothers in their current capacity. As Aldous Huxley showed us in “Brave New World”, a community composed entirely of Alphas cannot function.
Welcome to the aristocracy my young friend.
Seriously though; if you have not yet attended your interview, please post again and I will forward any advice that I can.
Bill
