Weapons: Possible career?

[Milkman Dan]

I was sitting around and pondering this morning. I'd be really interested in working in ballistics/bullet design or gun design. Is there any college degrees that would specifically apply to this and help me start a career in the area, or is it really more of a personal experience type job?

[gYmBaG]

im sure you have to have some sort of degrees in either a mathamatics or a science, im not really sure

[Captain Colon]

physics and engineering are the first two that pop into my head, I would look into gunsmithing courses and handloading also.

[gYmBaG]

im sure if go to a website that makes and sells guns or ammo you can ask them.

[Golgatha]

While Gunsmithing would be a cool hobby, I wouldn't really want it to turn into a career.

[SWATJester_os]

Mechanical Engineering.

Trust me. It will be much more useful to you than a degree in physics. You'll also get all the math and physics you'll need, PLUS the engineering knowledge you would too.

[Sharpshooter6]

Mechanical Engineering.

Trust me. It will be much more useful to you than a degree in physics. You'll also get all the math and physics you'll need, PLUS the engineering knowledge you would too.

It's what I am going into.

[Mirsky]

Mech Eng was probably the hardest course in the university I went to, only architecture and med degrees seem to be harder.

[Degree:N]

Mech Eng was probably the hardest course in the university I went to, only architecture and med degrees seem to be harder.
Hmm, it was quite down the list of difficult courses where I went. It was more like: Electrical, Mechatronics, Chemical, Aeronautical, Mechanical.

[Milkman Dan]

Mechanical Engineering.

Trust me. It will be much more useful to you than a degree in physics. You'll also get all the math and physics you'll need, PLUS the engineering knowledge you would too.
I'm seriously considering going into something like that. I've always liked tinkering with things since I was a kid. I used to take them apart and see if I could put them back together, and tried to see how they worked. I was considering a degree in Computer Science, but I'm being more and more turned off by the monotony that seems to come in mind if I became a programmer or relegated to using my degree for computer repairs.

[FaKToR]

I'm not sure you know what Comp. Sci. is exactly if you think it's just programming or repairing comps.

[Milkman Dan]

I'm not sure you know what Comp. Sci. is exactly if you think it's just programming or repairing comps.
I know what it is, but I just know sometimes it's hard to find a job, especially with a comp. sci. degree, and you often find yourself in a job in which you're overqualified for.

[SinistralRifleman]

Most gun companies are small when compared to other corporations...a large gun company is probably 100-300 employees total. Average gun companies probably have 1-2 dozen.

If you want to be a gunsmith, become a machinist. Gunsmiths are really specialized machinists...if you are a real machinist you can do that to pay your bills and do gunsmithing as a hobby.

In the gun industry who you know is more important than what you know. Being actively involved in the shooting community, competition shooting etc. will get you in with many small shops. Also if you want to make products that aren't total crap, I highly suggest becoming an active shooter. There are a lot of companies I can name that have college educated engineers that make things that aren't optimal because they have no personal understanding of what the product needs to do, or simply aren't user friendly at all.

This is one strength the company I work for has...we are all shooters, we use everything we sell, we can design things based on our own experience, not what someone else is telling us it should be.

How much do you like firearms? How happy would you be making less money working in the firearms industry than you would someplace else?

[Milkman Dan]

How much do you like firearms? How happy would you be making less money working in the firearms industry than you would someplace else?
Well, I'm not looking to get rich in life. I'd like to earn a living that would allow some sort of purchasing power, but also be happy with what I do.

How much would someone earn in the firearms industry, generally, or is it too specific on the job? I'd be happying earning around $50k a year, honestly.

Some day, I want to be like that fat gun guy on the History Channel, because he knows everything.

[FiftyCalibre]

Mech eng is the way to go

Im doing it right now adn its DAMN hard. Maths, physics and a combination of the 2 gets REALLY boring FAST

[SinistralRifleman]

Well, I'm not looking to get rich in life. I'd like to earn a living that would allow some sort of purchasing power, but also be happy with what I do.

How much would someone earn in the firearms industry, generally, or is it too specific on the job? I'd be happying earning around $50k a year, honestly.

Some day, I want to be like that fat gun guy on the History Channel, because he knows everything.

Well if you want to make $50K a year, the gun business isn't the place to be...unless you own a company that is prosperous.

I theoretically make $25K a year...to do all the same stuff and get all the same toys, I'd need to make at least double that. So you need to assess what your life priorities are...BTW a lot of chicks don't like guns, and will call you a "death merchant" to your face.

Regarding college...well it probably won't do you any good. I walked away from college in disgust to work in the gun industry. The owner of our company never finished college either. All the people I know with college degrees in the gun industry, ARE DOING NOTHING RELATED TO WHAT THEIR DEGREE IS! The retail manager of one of the largest gun shops in the phoenix area has a Bachelor's in English.

Our chief engineer/machinist never graduated high school, he got a GED and taught himself what he knows, augmenting it with specific college classes for what he needed to know. This same guy worked for Boeing Ordnance before he started working for us on contract projects.

If you do want to become involved in the gun business here are your options

1) Become actively involved in the shooting sports and gun community. Makes contacts, get to know people.

2) Join the military to gain experience and get some street creds. A good portion of the people in the firearms industry were in the military at some point...I myself never was. If you have been in the military you don't have to work as hard to prove to some people that you know what you're talking about and it will be easier to relate to others.

3) Do both.

[CheeseSteakJim]

BTW a lot of chicks don't like guns, and will call you a "death merchant" to your face.
But if you're worried about that, keep in mind that there are also women who will go either way, depending on who gets to them first. If you get to a women who thinks "Well, guns aren't all that bad... I've never shot one, though." then you're pretty much in the clear.

[Evil Superstar]

All the people I know with college degrees in the gun industry, ARE DOING NOTHING RELATED TO WHAT THEIR DEGREE IS! The retail manager of one of the largest gun shops in the phoenix area has a Bachelor's in English.

I don't know about the US but I seem to remember a study that showed that only about 1 in 10 actually has a job that is related to their degree.

[GrosPoisson]

That's probably about right. That's exactly why I'm majoring in the parascience called Economics, minoring in Political Science, and why I told the Comp. Sci. department to piss off. There's still a chance to get into the computer field if I so choose, and I'd rather be calling the shots than be an overworked coding bitch.

[TheFNG]

You guys crack me up! Anyone here "aside from Sinistral" ever work for a gunsmith? Or even a real Manufacturer?

Its not as glorious as you guys would think, and bullet technology isnt exactly something that changes alot, so there are not alot of "Bullet Engineers".

Just go get a normal job that pays well and buy whatever gun toys you are into.

[IchWarriorMkII]

Just not farming. Fuck thats shitty pay.

[GoatChomper]

I don't know about the US but I seem to remember a study that showed that only about 1 in 10 actually has a job that is related to their degree.
I'd be surprised to see it that low.....until I incorporated myself and started up my own translation business, my Spanish degree was never the primary job requirement. I've got a brother with a degree in history who's an attorney, another with a degree in art who's a technical writer for Dell, and a sister with degrees in both zoology and marine biology who's a government employee in a county assessor's office. Only one of my siblings is using his degree in physical therapy, and even then he's on the coaching staff of a high school.

Over time, people often tend to go into management and other fields.....I did, my father did as an Army doctor, and an uncle with a doctorate in chemistry and his wife with a doctorate in physics have spent years working for the department of defense outside a laboratory.

[SWATJester_os]

It seems to me that number, evil s, would be largely consistant of Doctors and Lawyers

[GrosPoisson]

It seems to me that number, evil s, would be largely consistant of Doctors and Lawyers

True, true. A family friend's daughter is taking English for her undergrad degree. Afterwards? Med school. The idea is that she loves English, and it's a heck of a lot easier in terms of keeping her GPA up at astronomical levels.

[uglygun]

Sinistral and I have talked about this some in the past and his posts in this thread echo things he has mentioned to me in the past.

I'm at the point with my current job that if things don't turn around in about 1 year then I'm gonna consider a career change. I'm hardly making enough money to live on my own currently, forget having enough disposable income to start gun plumming on even a hobby level.

To add to what Sinistral said, if you can't branch out and get to know folks in the industry then the military is a valid option. Go work for the military in an armory as a gun plummer and do everything you can to excell in repairing and if you are lucky custom building accurized rifles. There are a couple succesful custom shops out there doing nothing but turning out accurized rifles and full tilt "sniper rifles" built to military specs, that kind of experience doesn't really come in the civilian gun building market. Coming out of the military with the experience of an armorer should be able to make you very marketable to a variety of companies in the firearms world from the little custom shops up to the big mass production companies.


I'm sort of at a point in my life where I wish I just bit the bullet and joined the military to go into working in an armory and maybe look into competitive shooting.

Something that a couple of gun builders have told me is, "If you love shooting, don't come to the gun industry as you'll shoot less and less and work more and more." Basically, you'll be around guns all the time but you will spend little time shooting them.