Technical This poll is for those of us amateurs with no formal training

I may be slow, but I sure do poor work.

 

I'd rate myself an 8 or 9 at knowing what tasks are beyond my capabilities.
I've been around enough fabricators in my life to know that 'most' guys that think they can weld actually just glue things together...thanks, but I'll find someone that knows what the hell they're doing instead of trusting my life and yours to an inferior weld. I can design, layout, cut and fit parts for a weldment, but I don't try to delude myself into thinking I could weld 'em together. Bubble gum welds are my biggest peeve.
I can do a tune up, but it won't be a race winner or Mobile Economy Run winner.
Disassemble, clean, reassemble stuff with a bomb can paint job...8
Bodywork...Uh oh, better call Macco.
Fetch parts and beer....10.
Offer my (expert, not to questioned) opinion...12+.

 

I´d describe myself as an "averagely skilled shade tree mechanic", but I´m also pretty bone headed and don´t give in easily , so most things I screwed up work out on the 2nd or 3rd try. On a "shade tree mechanic´s " scale I´d see myself as 4-5, on a "pro " scale as a 0,5.

 

As a builder I make a really good truck driver.

 

I would like to say I'm a 7+. But any of us can get it right once!!

 

I rated myself a 6. "I'm not as good as I once was, but I'm as good once as I ever was."

 

When I take a step back and admire my work, I usually rank myself in the 10-12 range. Then reality sets in, I come here and see how you guy's make your stuff look like a piece of fine jewelry, and then I'm forced to rate my work at a -3. And that's being really generous! Merry Christmas Everybody!!!

 

At age 73—-first “hotrod” 40 ford convert at age 16–-been building Flatheads over 55 years—-do everything but paint and upholstery. Rated myself an 8 but after looking thru other responses might have overrated myself but I have a lot of confidence in my “finished” projects.

 

I feel the important point here is, we all have are strengths and weaknesses. But we continue to try, learn and refine are skills and the outcomes . I think most of us get a feeling of great personal satisfaction when it all works out.

 

I rated myself in the middle of the road @ 5. Everybody does something well and everybody has their limitations! I know my limits...

I grew up a poor boy on the farm, and if you wanted anything, you had to make it happen and build it yourself. I can do a lot of stuff and some of it really cool (and some of it not so cool).

I like being able to build just about anything I need or want. I don't have to have the best of everything, but it does have to work well and be presentable. I love knowing why and how to build horsepower and putting it to the ground!

Some things I just don't like doing, like upholstery, body work and electrical (and it shows). Some things I would rather someone else did it, but I couldn't afford it, so I'd give it a try.

When I worked at the Harley dealer as a kid, there was a sign in the back of the shop that said:
"I've been doing so much, with so little, for so long,
that I can do just about anything, with nothin'!"

That about says it all for me...

 

we the unqualified ,led be the un willing have been doing the believable so long ,with so little that we now attempt the impossible with nothing . some times i think im all right till i see some of the skills displayed here and realize im a legend in my own mind!!! did take welding in community .but dressed casually . i still give me a 7 . im not sure i could get 7 to agree

 

When the things I work on for other people work fantastic, I'm a 9. When I work on my own, and it won't even cough or backfire, I revert to 1 or 2.
I have many friends who weld ... I try to stay on their good side.

 

Don, Didn't you mean a Jack OF all trades instead of Jack off? HRP

 

I was born to build things. I am blessed with good hands. Spent my whole working life in industrial construction and fabrication. I've built a lot of stuff from bridges to houses to kitchen cabinets to stained glass windows to hot rods and race cars. I built stuff all day at work and came home and built some more stuff at night. Constantly building something. I can't stop. I built all my hot rods and racecars from the frame to finish paint and upholstery right in my shop.
Your rating question is hard to answer. Some of my skills are pretty finely honed such as welding and steel fabrication. I want to give myself an 8 or 9. Other skills such as upholstery and painting are considerably less developed. How about a 3 or 4. Mechanical skills warrant an 8 or so. Electrical, a 5, Body work, 6. SBC engine building and tuning, an 8.
I love building cabinets. I learned stained glass for cabinet doors. For working in different mediums such as steel, glass, and wood, I figure if you are a builder and can measure, cut and fasten them together you can build anything. It just takes different tools to cut and fasten the different mediums.
I don't want to seem immodest or cocky, but I'm giving myself a 8 overall. Now at 70 years old, if speed is part of the rating system, that 8 will go down some!!

 

Back before I joined the HAMB I would have thought I would be about an 8 or 9. I did it all.. welding, body work, paint, mechanics. Well, everything but upholstery, I usually sold the car before putting the final interior in it.
But after seeing some of the artists on here perform what look like miracles in sheetmetal and paint and fabrication, I thought I may be more like a 3 or 4. Then considering that my stuff looks better to other people than it does to me, I settled on a 5. As my faculties degrade over time I know I will be worse but I keep trying. Thats one reason it takes me so long to get things done.
MERRY CHRISTMAS!

 

I remember a saying: This stuff is hard, if it was easy everybody would do it. The hard, is what makes it great.

 

No, I said what I meant. My attempt at humor.

 

I gave myself an 8 but after the other day, I might have to revise that. For 6 weeks I've been trying to get a stock 48 fan as low as I can to avoid the upper radiator hoses and in my mind, I eventually hatched a plan involving machining a spacer to get the fan forward far enough to work and moving the generator over to the right head to make room for the spacer. I mean I've studied on this so hard that I'd wake up in the middle of the night with another possible solution. All this is to avoid the adjuster screw on the vacuum brake on the distributor. The other day, the old farmer down the road stopped by to see what I was doing. I explained the problem to him, he looked at the fan mount and the distributor for about 2 minutes. Then he asked why didn't I just replace the adjuster screw with a shorter hex socket head because I'd gain the clearance I needed and the fan would still be in the proper place. I've changed my original opinion of my skill level to a 5.

 

Share what you know. Learn what you don't.

While I am a proponent of introspection, I am very wary of applying a rating to one's self. That is a job for others.

 

I rate myself at a 7 based on the 58 years that I have been messing with car. I got started in 1962 in High School and did my last project in 2016.

 

I am not smart enough to know my limitations so I keep trying until I get barely adequate. I do all my own work, fab, body,mechanical, upholstery and paint, not great but it makes me happy. On hamb I rate myself about a 3 but in the general population I would be a 9 or10

 

I'm more of a "I know a little about lots of things and not a lot about anything" kind of guy. When it comes to my skills I usually know my limitations and know who to rely on to handle the stuff I can't or shouldn't do.

 

Didn't vote. I consider myself adequate in certain things and down right inept at others. Necessity being the mother of invention and what not, when you're broke and want things, you learn to make them.

Grew up in a poor house and, as a kid, had to make the toys I wanted. I made this kick ass Star Trek phaser out of wood scraps once because the model kit and toys were pricey. "That's too expensive" and "maybe, if you're good, santa will bring it next year" were the common hollow phrases. Being raised in a Catholic house, being told I was "going to hell" constantly, and Santa not coming through left me thinking I was a shitty kid.

All I heard was "Stay in school and you'll do well", Well, I stayed in school, got a bachelors, went into the military to pay off student loans, studied medicine there, then got broken overseas playing pawn for the oil companies and Haliburton, rather than for god and country and all things "right" like they brainwashed us all to believe.

Guess what? All that school and I'm still broke as fuck. I'm 51 and it doesn't look like I'll be catching any breaks anytime soon. State nursing boards across the country wouldn't accept the training I got militarily, and these scars and wrinkles are keeping me from a modeling career. So... I should have dropped out of school in the 8th grade for all the good an "education" is doing me.

Besides, if I do find a way to make some side cash, if I make too much, they'll take my disability and I'd really be screwed and probably lose the house.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, a paycheck to paycheck life on disability will continue to force you to hone your creative side. I am so sick and goddamn tired of having to do things on the cheap. Just once, I'd like to actually be able to pay someone to do something cool, like this mountain of freakin' bodywork and paint I have to do on this old pickup of mine.

These guys with their "bought and paid" for, "carpet to carpet" trailer queens and what not, should thank their lucky stars for their station in life. Some of us will never get there.

If I had to choose a number, it would reflect the means I have a the time of the project. I could buy a 10 but have to settle for about a 4 depending on my checking account and availability of materials.

As much fun as this stuff is, it's equally as frustrating.

 

OK something I wouldn't normally do here. My chassis work, tube bending and Tig welding is probably about as good as anyone, but slowwwww. My basic bodywork, repairing small dents, metal finishing and paint work is as good as the job deserves. Lawnmower decks and trailer frames don't receive the level of attention that a show car gets. Engine assembly and tuning go slow but smoothly for the most part. Transmissions and torque converters are mysterious things that are left to my betters. At 69 years old now, I spend more time looking at the job than working on it.. Electrical work......there is a real shortcoming. I can USUALLY get a pair of jumper cables connected properly. A 2 hr. job for someone with skills may take me two weeks but they rarely smoke. Cheers and Merry Christmas to all.

 

Man, you are doing something cool. You are just having trouble seeing it.
And sincerely, thank you for your service.

 

I enjoyed your post and will share my technique for reducing that mountain of work on your old pickup. I've learned to stop looking at the job as a whole and set smaller goals. For example I will do a fender and get it in primer and ready to block sand, then move to the door and repeat the process until one day you'll look around and find that there are no more panels to do. Then I'll block sand the entire thing, seal and paint. Good luck.

 

i may not be grt but i work cheap !!!!!

 

Somedays I wreck my shoulder patting myself on the back. Then somedays I'm just a f----ng hack. Then somedays I know just enough to get myself in trouble!

 

ccian, got a shop, got tools and a car? I'd say you're doing pretty well, I grew up poor, walked to school barefoot in two feet of snow uphill both ways.....you know....never thought I'd get here. For me the cup is half full, waiting for more, feel lucky to have the stuff I never dreamed I'd have.