Rahul Dhinakaran Interview
Questions
Are you interested in working on-site at FeF or are you interested in remote collaboration?
- It's not exactly "remote" consultant. I'm a consultant and I spend a lot of time onsite. It's just for the hard core design I prefer to do it here (in India) as it doesn't require me to be at a place. I will be spending time onsite.
When are you available?
- I think we would have to split up the schedule (once we make one). The first schedule (the time I spend at OSE) would be for studying your requirement. This can be done remote so I can start right now. The next would be to study your requirement onsite. The time should be max 3 weeks for any product. Then i do concepts which again can be done remote and can be mailed to you. I might have to visit in between fr reference, etc. This could be for a week max. Once the concept is frozen i can then move to proper design and mfg drawings which can be done remote. The actual building should take 8-10 weeks. This can either be done here or there. Hope the above is clear. I think building, testing can happen at OSE i.e onsite hence I might have to be there the whole 8 weeks.
What are you interested in getting out of this opportunity?
- I get the satisfaction of having worked on machines. Its something I've been doing since I was a kid hence I use the words "love" when i talk about my work. I've always believed knowledge should be open source. Can you imagine how many Indian farmers would benefit if OSE started an Indian operation? I can help you guys with that. Agriculture is struggling here and OSE could help a LOT. I can help OSE establish itself in India.
What are your three strongest skills that you bring to this position?
- I can design machines very well...a love for all mechanical systems which I'm sure can be put to good use by OSE.
- Machine design is something I'm passionate about. I love agricultural machines like tractors which you can see a lot in the Sketchea site
What are the principles you use as guidance?
- Honesty...i cant live with a lie even for a minute. That might sound cliched but thats how I am. This is something my dad taught me when we were really bad financially. I live by that. Machine design is my first love so I want to contribute something through that.
What are your strengths and weaknesses?
- I love machine design so much that if something interesting pops up I tend to lose a bit financially just for the love of designing and building that machine.
What are some of your outside interests?
- Motorcycling, reading automotive history, motor sports (I used to work in a motor sport company before starting on my own), reading fiction (Grisham, Puzo, Archer, Wilbur Smith, etc).
Would you be willing to volunteer your time, or would you be seeking payment?
- I would be seeking payment
Tell me about at least one time you failed miserably and what you did about it?
- I've never failed "miserably" as failure doesn't cause me misery. I've failed big in sport..I used to be a cricketer (hope you are familiar with cricket) and failed to score big for nearly 3 years...I just kept going and scored big in year 4. Its not like I want to show I'm tough or anything... its just that I ensure failure teaches me, rahter than being bogged down by it.
Examples of Work
- 2 Bin Composter
- 3-Wheel Micro Tractor
- Many other PDFs emailed via .zip file to Opensourceecology@gmail.com