Your education can’t always prepare you for everything that may happen in your engineering career. You’re working on a project and everything is running smoothly when you realize “I don’t know how to tolerance this part!”. You know you need some reliable information but you don’t know where to turn.
Luckily for all of us, the Internet can bring us together to learn beyond the classroom on websites like Eng-Tips Forums.
Under a thread titled, Recommended Book for Graduate Design Engineer?, a user by the name of “TheDenman” writes, “I am looking for a book to help me with standard tolerances for different machining processes and materials. I need to teach myself how to tolerance my designs.”
Rather than recruit a team to hunt down such a book, the engineers responding on the thread provided resources they were familiar with and suggested a variety of alternative methods to gain the information.
1. Another user, “ShaggyPE,” provided a link to a page with a useful graphic similar to one found in machinery handbooks. This graphic provided a rough estimate of the order of magnitude on tolerance available or various machining processes. The page also provides a detailed account of other methods of choosing design tolerances.
2. A workbook in geometric dimensioning and tolerancing was suggested by “moon161”. The book was originally provided to him/her by a designer. “Modern Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing” includes theoretical information and a workbook section.
3. "The best answers tend to come from existing designs,” said “geesamand”. “Industry standards can sometimes be helpful too.”. Sometimes learning by example is the most effective method. Tolerance varies with material, manufacturing method, surface finish, size, et cetera.
4. “MiketheEngineer” adds, “While you may find some helpful books, I have always found that actually doing it is better - if you have the time. The shop guys can teach you things no book will ever explain...”, encouraging “The Denman” to learn in a hands-on manner from people with years of practical experience.
If you have any resources or advice that you’d like to share or technical questions that need answering, join the conversation at Eng-Tips Forums. To follow the thread for this article, click here.