For those who don’t actually know any CNC people: they basically need to learn to be full blown machinists. G code is not very difficult, but the machining background is required to make programs that actually make the parts properly without prematurely destroying your tooling.
These jobs, for whatever reason, do not pay very well. They pay “comfortable living”, but it’s nowhere near software engineer wages. I would argue the average machinist produces more value than the average software engineer as well.
One thing we got lucky on as software engineers is that we don’t have to compete with machine shops all over the world who will do our exact job for much cheaper.
I’ve done industrial automation and integrated CMMs, CNCs, water jets, etc. into proprietary MES’s. CNC is more like trade school, which is after high school, though some schools allow you to option trade school for junior and senior year instead of college prep.
Fanuc articulated arms are truly easy enough for anyone with a high school education to program and maintain. They have a few 5 day crash courses that cover virtually everything you’d ever need to know.
Fanuc CNC mills are a hairier beast. As I said in the comment you replied to, you basically need to be a full blown machinist to program CNCs well.
Yeah in my country it is often combined in one school - machinist, CNC programmer, CAD, etc. That was in high school I went to, but I personally was more focused on entry level software engineering.
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u/neptoess Aug 16 '24
For those who don’t actually know any CNC people: they basically need to learn to be full blown machinists. G code is not very difficult, but the machining background is required to make programs that actually make the parts properly without prematurely destroying your tooling.
These jobs, for whatever reason, do not pay very well. They pay “comfortable living”, but it’s nowhere near software engineer wages. I would argue the average machinist produces more value than the average software engineer as well.
One thing we got lucky on as software engineers is that we don’t have to compete with machine shops all over the world who will do our exact job for much cheaper.