It's not a "very strangely" defined Te, by "some socionists", it's basic Socionics.
Socionics Si seamlessly integrates with Te actually... Si processes of the sensory "glue" for sensory relations between objects work very well with the Te approach for physical jobs etc. It isn't just about some bits of how to create physical comfort, that's just part of it.
Ti in Socionics is more "left-brained" than in MBTI so that's how it adds up for LSI and TiSe being the inspector in Socionics (whereas SiTe is the inspector in MBTI). It's about logically organising and structuring information in a strict way and is less directly physical than Si, so yeah the idea is that it works better for those office jobs. Though of course not just for those jobs. Even in MBTI they recommend physical jobs too for ISTJ like for any ST type.
Se creative in Socionics definitely works with all those things you listed, a mechanic is more about the "sensory glue" along with Te tools/mechanisms.
Ti isn't blind without Se lol.
It just takes basic visual information (from the V1 etc that you yourself mentioned) and other incoming basic information and taking the information to a higher level in processing, it organises logically instead of fully immersing in the Sensing physical side of the information.
This is my take anyhow (and in a simplified way ofc)