Ok, so engineers aren’t necessarily renowned for their scintillating wit. But there are a lot of in-jokes in engineering. We do a job that most people really don’t understand, which means there is a rich vein of comedy material that only us engineers will understand. We’ve looked high and low for some of the best engineering jokes. Some will make you groan. Others laugh out loud. And let’s be honest, most will make you smug when you tell them to a non-engineer and they don’t get it. Enjoy!

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A uniform beam walks into a bar...

A uniform beam walks into a bar. The barman asks, "What would you like, good sir?" 

The beam replies "Ummm… just give me a moment."

Mathematics

Client: "How do you estimate how long a project will take?"

Engineer: "I add the time needed for each activity, then multiply by pi."

Client: "Why multiply by pi?"

Engineer: "It explains why my estimates are always irrational."

A vicar, a doctor and an engineer

A vicar, doctor and engineer were playing a round of golf. They got to the third tee and were delayed by people still playing the hole.

The engineer lost his patience, "What's going on? We’ve been here at least 20 minutes!"

The doctor nodded in agreement.

The vicar saw the green keeper walking by and shouted to him, "How come that group ahead of us are so slow?”

The green keeper replied, "Oh, they’re all blind firemen. They all lost their sight pulling school children out of a burning building, so they can play anytime for free.”

Everyone was silent for a few seconds.

The vicar finally said, "Oh dear. I’ll be sure to pray for them. Well done on such charitable work good fellow."

The doctor added, "Yes, well done to you. I’ll make sure they get the best treatment at the eye unit in the hospital too."

The engineer, arms folded, tapping his feet said, "Ok, but if they’re blind then why can’t they play at night?”

A mathematician, a physicist and an engineer

A mathematician, physicist, and engineer are all trying to find the volume of a yellow bouncy ball.

The mathematician gets his callipers out and measures the diameter, then evaluates the integral. 

The physicist fetches a bowl of water, drops the ball in and measures the displacement. 

The engineer strolls up with book in hand, checks for a serial number and looks up the volume in his yellow bouncy ball table.

The Constipated Engineer

Did you hear the one about the constipated engineer? He managed to work it out with a pencil. Turns out it was a natural log.

The fire joke

There’s a fire in the middle of a room and 3 buckets of water in the corner.

A physicist walks in, takes a bucket of water, pours it around the fire and waits for the fire to put itself out.

An engineer walks in and pours a bucket on the fire, it doesn’t go out so he goes off to check the fire safety standards.

A mathematician walks in, looks at the fire and the remaining bucket of water, convinces himself there’s a solution and walks out.

A physicist, a chemist and an engineer

A chemist, a physicist, and an engineer are sailing out at sea. The boat sinks and they’re marooned on a desert island. Luckily, they have a bag with a can of food in it, but no tin opener.

The chemist tries to open the can first by trying to erode it. No luck. 

The physicist takes off his glasses and focuses sunlight on the can to try and burn the lid off. No joy. 

Finally, the engineer shouts “Hold on, I’ve got an idea! Let’s assume the can is open!”

The engineer's wife

A wife asks her husband, an engineer, "Darling, can you please go to the shop buy one pint of milk and if they have eggs, get a dozen!" 

Off he goes. Half an hour later the husband returns with 12 pints of milk. 

His wife stares at him and asks, "Why on earth did you get 12 pints of milk?" 

"Well… they had eggs" he replied.

Mechanical or Civil?

What's the main difference between Mechanical and Civil Engineers?

Mechanical Engineers build weapons, Civil Engineers build targets

The definition of an engineer

Definition of an engineer: somebody who makes precise guesswork based on unreliable data provided by people with questionable knowledge. Never wrong. Likes tables.