25.06.2012 (Monday)
10 a.m.
Waited for Mr John Yancone to pick me up from the hotel to the Cummins office in Charleston.
Scott Wildermuth was the one who greeted me instead. He had a really nice ride ( 2 door BMW)
Signed me in. Handed me over to Christine Whitlock.
We were given to the care of a Mr. Brandon, an Applications engineer who gave us a tour of the 'test-cells' at the plant. They were testing engines that could run on both natural gas and diesel. Everything was top secret so I couldn't take any pictures. Brandon was a graduate from Purdue University with a degree in Mechanical Engineering. He really knew his engines, that guy did. He explained where everything went, tubes, cooling and heat exchangers, systems... I had to slip on these modified steel toes that went over my sneakers. Quite refreshing that I didn't have to actually take off my shoes and wear boots! and of course, the safety glasses!
The ultimate cool thing was that Brandon was the one in charge of approving the engines with IMO Tier II marine engines (KTA50). The same ones I was looking through when doing engine selections for my final year project (OVD), high speed catamaran ferry for Dubai. How cool is that?

The sign up sheet

View of their offices, not much different from any other office, Cubicles like any other

Tammy toured me through their mini manufacturing plant. They still used a hundred percent human labour for modifications to their engines. Cummins uses a base engine for everything, which is then modified according to their respective functions; industry, off-road, mining, marine, offshore and railway. The plant was divided up into sections. Each section had their own experts on it. Starting from the beginning till the end; manifold addition up to custom painting. It was an awesome experience overall. 

With Tammy, in front of the big C :)

After, we had to wait for Scot to come back to the office for a one to one conversation. He was the resident naval architect at Cummins, the only one, out of all the mechanical engineers!

Cummins logo

Waiting in the lobby for Scot Wildermuth

The clean lines and corporate colors reminded me of MISC

Finally spotted Scott and sat down to have a chat with him. Scott was in charge of customers who wanted custom fit outs for their vessels and he would design the propulsion drive for the vessel in these cases. I though this was actually the highlight of my day. I got some invaluable advice from him with regards to choosing career paths. Something he said really did strike me at that point; choose a job that will go well with what you liked to do when you were in school (AMC) coz you'll be doing it for the rest of your life. Some people are comfortable around computers, they love designing boats, CAD stuff. Others devote their lives to programming, and using CFD to find out the optimum conditions for propellers. Some might find teaching to be their cup of tea. Whatever it is, even with a naval architecture degree, there are niche areas where you can actually find yourself working in. Just go with your gut feeling and make sure you love what you do.

We went on and on for close to 2 hours I think, just discussing various naval architectural stuff, which was awesome! Turned out they use Pro Engineer a lot! And the program was exactly like CATIA!!! They also use Orca too. So this was basically a wrap for my first day in Charleston. Next on the agenda was dinner with the Cummins engineering team.