Is aerospace engineering a good major: 8 facts

Aerospace engineering is a good career for students who are passioned and interested in aeronautics like building planes. Also, for people who love astronomy, designing and building rockets or airspaces. Regrading the high salaries that aerospace engineers can earn, the market demand for this industry is not huge as in other engineering fields.

So in this post, we’re going to discover the 8 facts that students should know before going and picking this major. So keep reading to prevent the most interesting mistakes people make in this case.

1 – Aerospace engineering doesn’t have a potential market demand

According to bls an aerospace engineer begins with $70,000 a year as a junior salary and attends $120,000 in a mid-career. So aerospace engineering is one of the most and best rewarding engineering careers.

In addition, even if you didn’t get an engineering occupation, you can still work as an electrician and get over $60,000 a year. But getting a job in aerospace engineering is not easy like other engineering occupations.

If we compare the market growth of mechanical or electrical engineering, we find aerospace engineering to be the smallest industry. Currently, it got only 5100 occupations, while 300,000 occupations are in mechanical engineering.

So it is not easy to find a job as an aerospace engineer compared to electrical or mechanical engineers. This is one thing you should be aware of before going to this major.

2 – Aerospace engineering is though

Aerospace engineering is one of the toughest majors that’s included a combination between math and physics. In other words, students study many physics Topics that require a good level of math.

 The famous subject aerospace engineers focus on is calculus, which implements mathematics subjects like derivatives, integrals, and differential equations in multiple applications, especially design. So if you aren’t good at calculus, aerospace engineering is completely to avoid.

 In addition, you will need to study a lot of physics, especially thermodynamics, fluid dynamics, and aerodynamics.

These classes are heavy in mathematics calculus basis, especially derivatives integral.

 For instance, in thermodynamics, you would be using a lot of multi-variable subjects calculus like double and even triple integrals to calculate volumes and surfaces airplane shaps. 

 if you want to know why thermodynamics you could check this article: Thermodynamics is so hard and here is why: 9 reasons

3 – Aerospace engineering has 2 specializations

Aerospace engineering has principally 2 specializations:

• Aeronautical engineering
• Astronautical engineering

If you major in aeronautical engineering, you will be working in the artifact industry, designing aircraft and propulsion systems. For instance, designing the aerodynamics systems and learning material science used in aircraft.

If you major in astronautical engineering, which is working on space aircraft or army rockets, in this case, you will be eligible to work with the army or Mondial organizations and companies like space x or NASA.

4 – Aerospace engineering needs passioned people

Aerospace engineering needs or requires nerds, not people who only seek this field for money. Because if you are one of them, you will soonly quit based on the heavy math and physics subjects you have to surpass.

So to verify or test that you are meant for aerospace engineering, you have to respond to these 2 questions:

Are you passionate about airplanes?

Are you passionate about cars?

If you love to work in one of these industries, airplane or automobile, maybe aerospace engineering is for you.

But what is the relation between a car and aerospace engineering?

Aerospace engineering brings their skills into the automotive company, especially the aerodynamics knowledge helping them improve the car’s dynamics. In addition, if you are skilled, you can work in sports domains like Formula 1 or MotoGP.

The last thing to verify if aerospace engineering is for you or not is if you like to work with your hand-building physical things. In other words, use a hammer and screwdriver and start crafting things.

It doesn’t mean that aerospace engineers do the handy job or use hammers and screwdrivers, but the meaning is if you love to design physical things and see them moving in reality, not like making software apps online.

5 – Aerospace engineering requires having good skills in design

As an aerospace engineer, you need to have good skills in design most aerospace engineers use 4 principal software:

1. CAD
2. CATIA
3. CREO
4. ANYSYS
5. CFD

CAD, CATIA, and CREO are the most software used in aerospace design. Aerospace engineers use this softwares to design airplanes or spacecraft.

ANYSYS is software that aerospace and mechanical engineers use to pretend and test the material resistance of an object. In other words, determine the breaking point of this material or the maximum force it could resist before collapsing. 

CFD is software that studies the fluid behavior in mechanical objects to build suitable designs. In other words, it studies all hydraulics components in the machine-like plains or rockets.

So design is really important in aerospace engineering.

6 – Aerospace engineering requires having good skills in this specific language programming

Most people don’t know that aerospace engineering requires programming. Because plains rocket has embedded systems like:

• radar
• lidar
• GPS
• accelerometer
• altimetres
• and many other sensors

So you will study a lot of electrical engineering subjects, especially electronics and programming. The famous and high demanded programming language that aerospace engineering needs to learn is C++.

This domain is called embedded systems. You can discover more about it in the article below.

Embedded systems without a Master(9 resources)

7 – you have to be comfortable working for an army

Most aerospace engineers specialize in astronomical fieldwork with a state or Mondial organization like NASA. In other words, if you decide to take this specialty in aerospace engineering, you will likely be working for the army it could designing even arms.

Many people don’t like to work for armies designing arms that could kill thousands of innocents. So if you want to them and don’t like to work with the army, you will find some hardships in finding a job in this specialty.

In this case, choosing Aeronautical engineering will be better than working for civil companies like Boeing or Airbus, etc

8 – Aerospace engineering is not popular as these engineering majors

Aerospace engineering is not a popular engineering major compared to electrical or mechanical engineering. You can see the number in the table below.

So if you are looking for a famous major with high market demand, aerospace engineering is not the best one.

Is aerospace engineering worth it (final thoughts )

aerospace engineering is worth it if you love it or are obsessed with it. It is not a high demanded engineering career. But it still has some remarkable growth rates in the market.

But if you like to find or integrate easily into the workforce and don’t care about passion, you can choose mechanical engineering. It is so close to aerospace engineering.

Most aerospace engineering began with mechanical engineering and then peruse their aerospace engineering studies by doing a master’s or Ph.D.