The holy grail of steel rulers
- Thread starter Woodmonkey
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novocaine
Established Member
MikeJhn":2rs942hx said:
how do you measure non flat pieces? or mark a line on something that's slightly cupped? there is a reason a good old rabone had some flex to it.
after all this, I'm sticking with my rabone 6,12,24" rulers, I got one chrome plated, that was a mistake, can't read the bloody thing now.
t8hants
Established Member
While you are all gloating about your new rules, I quite like my dirt cheap sc***fix set of three, a 6", 1' & a 2'.
Very heavily engraved stainless, with handy tables on the back.
Ideal for the harsh fabricating environment they are used in and not a disaster if on gets munched.
Very heavily engraved stainless, with handy tables on the back.
Ideal for the harsh fabricating environment they are used in and not a disaster if on gets munched.
Can't help feeling the original point of the thread has been lost (possibly not for the first time).
The holy grail of steel rulers (for me) is one side being metric and the other being imperial. And - important this - it should be left-reading on one edge, and right-reading on the other. If you want to argue about sub-divisions on each edge, have at it. But I'd be happy with 32nds on the imperial side, and whole MMs on the other. I've never found it, and if anyone can point me to such a thing I would have found *my* holy grail of steel rulers.
The holy grail of steel rulers (for me) is one side being metric and the other being imperial. And - important this - it should be left-reading on one edge, and right-reading on the other. If you want to argue about sub-divisions on each edge, have at it. But I'd be happy with 32nds on the imperial side, and whole MMs on the other. I've never found it, and if anyone can point me to such a thing I would have found *my* holy grail of steel rulers.
t8hants":1k2yxufq said:
I've bought a few metre rules from Screwfix / Toolstation; not one of them has been close to straight :?
How about this rule, divided by the pied, pouce and ligne?
http://www.burn-heart.com/shop/pied-du-roi-ruler
lurker
Le dullard de la commune
Does anyone else remember "The great story stick arguement" on this forum some years ago that resulted in several active members having a hissy fit and leaving?
Fortunately this thread has been a bit more grown up.
I still think you are all mad spending that sort of money on a rule(r), whats wrong with the time honoured way of nicking them from work?
Fortunately this thread has been a bit more grown up.
I still think you are all mad spending that sort of money on a rule(r), whats wrong with the time honoured way of nicking them from work?
novocaine
Established Member
lurker":2pp1cibo said:
these days people notice when you've got 12" down your pants.
RogerP
Established Member
Before I retired I worked in schools. Kids haven't been taught feet and inches for many years but when asked their height most boys would use imperial. "nearly 6 foot Sir" etc.
Eric The Viking
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The advantage of imperial distance and old LSD money was the ease of using fractions.
So often in woodworking you want to halve something or divide it into thirds, or whatever, and twelve units to one bigger one make this much more convenient (OK, not dividing by five or seven, but honestly, that's rarely necessary).
In contrast, Millimetres gives you a good working unit for simple construction work.
Sheet goods are sized as they are for all sorts of reasons. The most significant during the 1970s was that MMB machinery made imperial sizes, and thickness was easier to convert than length and breadth. Metric sizes are still approximations to / substitutes for imperial, as we need those sizes for convenience. I can just about get 8'x4' sheet goods up and down the stairs in my house. 3m x 1.5m would be impossible.
Plumbing pipes: well, we started it! Our copper pipe was imperially-sized, but measured to INSIDE diameter, not outside. Metric pipe is OD, so 15mm comes very close to thicker-walled 1/2" copper. During the big changeover plumbers could interconnect by thinning-down 1/2" pipe with emery cloth. I did exactly that on one of the last pieces of 1/2" in the house, just before last Christmas 2016). If you ever do this, err on the side of a slightly sloppy fit in a 15mm coupler, otherwise you risk the capillary action not working and pinholed joints when the flux washes out.
Converters were also available for the lazy (I've got one somewhere, as a museum piece).
Because there's nothing usefully close to the OD of 3/2", 22mm was chosen as converters were more practical. I have a few of those and they're still useful occasionally. And anyway, dies (plugs) to expand pipework so you could make soldered, overlapping joints without fittings were pretty common, as it was (and still is) standard practice with lead, and plumbers expected to be able to do it. You usually have to anneal new copper pipe first (it's significantly work-hardened by the thin-wall extrusion process), and be very careful, as the walls are much thinner than they used to be. But you can still get the tools and they are very handy to make repair couplers.
Personally, I'm happy with both systems, but I like the human scale of feet+inches.
According to Wikipedia, the Metre was originally supposed to be equal to one ten-millionth of the distance between the North Pole and the Equator. The French (who foisted it on everyone else) decided this was in accord with God's cosmic plan (don't go there, please!). But they got the primary measurement wrong, and actually it's a nothing - an entirely arbitrary unit, and not very useful for all that. Imagine how bloody awful it would have been if they'd decided on something half as long again...
...at least feet and inches make human-sized sense, and have some correlation with horses' bottoms.
E.
So often in woodworking you want to halve something or divide it into thirds, or whatever, and twelve units to one bigger one make this much more convenient (OK, not dividing by five or seven, but honestly, that's rarely necessary).
In contrast, Millimetres gives you a good working unit for simple construction work.
Sheet goods are sized as they are for all sorts of reasons. The most significant during the 1970s was that MMB machinery made imperial sizes, and thickness was easier to convert than length and breadth. Metric sizes are still approximations to / substitutes for imperial, as we need those sizes for convenience. I can just about get 8'x4' sheet goods up and down the stairs in my house. 3m x 1.5m would be impossible.
Plumbing pipes: well, we started it! Our copper pipe was imperially-sized, but measured to INSIDE diameter, not outside. Metric pipe is OD, so 15mm comes very close to thicker-walled 1/2" copper. During the big changeover plumbers could interconnect by thinning-down 1/2" pipe with emery cloth. I did exactly that on one of the last pieces of 1/2" in the house, just before last Christmas 2016). If you ever do this, err on the side of a slightly sloppy fit in a 15mm coupler, otherwise you risk the capillary action not working and pinholed joints when the flux washes out.
Converters were also available for the lazy (I've got one somewhere, as a museum piece).
Because there's nothing usefully close to the OD of 3/2", 22mm was chosen as converters were more practical. I have a few of those and they're still useful occasionally. And anyway, dies (plugs) to expand pipework so you could make soldered, overlapping joints without fittings were pretty common, as it was (and still is) standard practice with lead, and plumbers expected to be able to do it. You usually have to anneal new copper pipe first (it's significantly work-hardened by the thin-wall extrusion process), and be very careful, as the walls are much thinner than they used to be. But you can still get the tools and they are very handy to make repair couplers.
Personally, I'm happy with both systems, but I like the human scale of feet+inches.
According to Wikipedia, the Metre was originally supposed to be equal to one ten-millionth of the distance between the North Pole and the Equator. The French (who foisted it on everyone else) decided this was in accord with God's cosmic plan (don't go there, please!). But they got the primary measurement wrong, and actually it's a nothing - an entirely arbitrary unit, and not very useful for all that. Imagine how bloody awful it would have been if they'd decided on something half as long again...
...at least feet and inches make human-sized sense, and have some correlation with horses' bottoms.
E.
bugbear
Established Member
That's only true if the initial size happens to be a whole number of feet!Eric The Viking":2e3d9g9y said:
Even then, while dividing 4 feet into 3 equal parts comes out nicely, but if you've got a 4 foot
rail, and want to have 4 off 2" stiles (leaving 3 gaps), the gaps are... wait a minute ...
let me think ... no, don't tell me ...
1' 1 4/12" (and for $DEITIES sake, don't use the 1/16" scale on the ruler
when marking that out).
What could be easier? (rhetorical
) BugBear
I want a ruler that measures things in giraffe necks and small intestines. Thankfully, there is the weird convertor site to keep me right: http://www.weirdconverter.com/lengthheight.php
FWIW there are 0.56 giraffe necks per metre. You're welcome
FWIW there are 0.56 giraffe necks per metre. You're welcome
novocaine
Established Member
smoots. anything else is a comparison to them.
1 smoot plus or minus an ear.
1 smoot plus or minus an ear.
Nice looking rules,
Think I'll order some.
Wish they did one with16ths of a cm. :twisted:
Think I'll order some.
Wish they did one with16ths of a cm. :twisted:
Kept looking at this thread growing in answers and thinking 'How good can a steel rule(r) be!?!' 7 Pages? Really?
So I looked back in. Ahhhh.
TBH, I'm only asking for a 'friend' who works in a certain industry.
Is 12mm better than 12" ?
Why can't 'he' get any work these days?
Why do women point and laugh at my 'friend' when he wears Speedos to the beach?
When he visits Japan the men laugh too! Whats that all about?!?
My 'Friend' is puzzled and confused.
Any advice I can pass on to him?
He's thinking about finding a different job tbh.
So I looked back in. Ahhhh.
TBH, I'm only asking for a 'friend' who works in a certain industry.
Is 12mm better than 12" ?
Why can't 'he' get any work these days?
Why do women point and laugh at my 'friend' when he wears Speedos to the beach?
When he visits Japan the men laugh too! Whats that all about?!?
My 'Friend' is puzzled and confused.
Any advice I can pass on to him?
He's thinking about finding a different job tbh.
Bod
Established Member
Woodmonkey
Established Member
Nothing else to say really
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