Great Gifts for Your Engineer: An Original Guide

Shopping for gifts for engineers is notoriously difficult. Engineers aren't concerned with materialistic items, they're frugal, and they insist that the items the do own are practical. So what do you do? The trick is to find that gift giving sweet spot, something they'll still like, but they wouldn't necessarily get for themselves. Here's our list:

1. Antique Tools

If we said head down to the hardware store and drop a cool $1000 on some new equipment for the shop, your beloved little engineer would probably be pretty be tickled pink, but we're trying to keep this in this a little more affordable.

E-bay is chalk full of awesome vintage tools. May we suggest an oscilloscope for an electrical engineer, pocket calipers for a mechanical engineer, and for a civil engineer, maybe a nice theodolite?

2. Blueprints

Blueprints are like great works of art to engineers. Thinkgeek carries some nice Space Shuttle blueprints, and there's the classic Engineer's Guide to Drinks.

If you want to go the DIY right, the US Patent and Trademark Office has plenty of cool design drawings. Check out the original safety razor patent filed by Gillette. Print it up and frame it!

3. Panic Button Light Switch Kit

We may have invented it, but we thing the Panic Button Light Switch Kit make an awesome gift for any engineer. Fun, functional, and an easy DIY home project rolled into one.