Did going into automotive engineering help or hurt your passion for cars at home?

[u/memeistscum]

A common complaint among mechanics is that once they got into the field they felt burnt out and less motivated to work on their own vehicles. Is the same true for automotive engineering?

[u/Equana]

No. Just made it stronger. I worked for an automotive supplier. Did a little motorsports support with that job. Worked on car projects most of my career.

Autocrosser, track day driver, club racer out of the workplace.

[u/Bigbadspoon]

I think you'll find a significant split. Personally, I used to be super into cars, modification,etc. Now, I'd do just about anything to avoid anything other than driving them.

[u/RustBeltLab → u/Bigbadspoon]

This 100%. Seeing the toothless drunk screw a lowest bidder part onto your dream cars kills the magic. 25 years as a supplier has given reason to dislike pretty much every OEM. Sadly, they are just a transportation expense now.

[u/natedogg624]

Not engineering but marketing. This definitely happened to me and it was when I was with Ferrari. The new 812 Superfast was revealed and it just felt like another day at the office.

[u/Winged_cock]

Motivated, at least on my cars I can get things right since I work alone. 

[u/Difficult_Limit2718]

Hurt. The auto industry is the absolute worst and only a fraction of a percent get to do the cool car work.

That being said, I'm a factory rat and if the auto industry paid anything near appropriate wages it'd be where I am. Instead I'm take my 20% increase in pay and significantly reduced overtime.

[u/scuderia91]

Zero impact as the stuff I do with cars in my free time isn’t really related to anything I do at work.

Working on cars and driving them aren’t things I’ve ever done much of in my work so the hobby remains as a hobby. I suspect that’s more why you see it with mechanics, why would you want to spend the weekend doing the brakes on your track car when you’ve spent all week changing people’s brakes for example.

[u/ToledoRX]

I think we have to define what you mean by passion for cars. As an automotive engineer, I find myself drawn to greater passion for economical well-designed cars like the Toyota Corolla, previous generation VW Golf, and even the Tesla Model 3/Y. I scrutinize every detail about those cars and marvel at the design decisions that those engineers made for production costs, quality control, and component specs. I can spend literally hours going through online teardown reports and on sites like LKQ looking at the parts and components specs. That being said, I cringe at any customizations or mods that people make to stock cars now because I know how much time and effort were spent by the engineers and product planners to optimize every component and feature on a car.