Tape Measure: I Don't Know How to Use It

[Desolus]

So today I found this brand new Stanley Fatmax tape measure in my tool box. I thought, oh nice, wonder why I never use this one....

Now I remember. A buddy of mine in Europe that I used to mod flashlights for sent it to me upon my request. You won't see them like this in your local hardware store here in the States.

The damn thing has these funny numbers on it. That's why I never used it, I don't know how! What the heck was I thinking when I asked my buddy to specifically send me one like this!

Just a joke fellas, no offense to the metric guys. And NO, we will never convert over!

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Being a 90's kid, I use metric and imperial fluently; there's no need for me to convert to anything.

 

[brino]

They don't have to spend all of third and fourth grade teaching them how to work with fractions!

It's not _ALL_ of fourth grade, just four quarters of it!
-brino

 

[Radarguy]

Just a little trivia that I believe has been lost in the last 40 years. As a left handed person I pick up on these things but did you know that the tape measure you buy in the tool stores now a days is a left handed ruler?

Back in the days of folding wooden rulers it was common to be able to purchase a left handed or right handed ruler. But for some reason, I don't know why, when the tool manufacturers went to these automatic tape measures they settled on making only left handed models.

How can you tell, you may ask. Or whats the difference? The difference is in which hand you hold the ruler, which hand you write with and do you want to see the numbers right side up or upside down. Take this test! So if you write with your right hand hold your pencil and grab your tape measure in your left hand and extend it naturally to the right. The numbers are upside down. So have you noticed that if you want the numbers to be right side up, you have to either switch hands that you hold your pencil with or cross your arms. Very awkward for the righty.

If your at a flea market or antique tool sale you may find some old wooden folding rulers that are right handed.

Anyway, that's my trivia for the day.

Russell

 

[4GSR]

Another trivia bit. Anyone that has ever worked in a structural fabricators shop should know this. The dimensions on the drawings are always dimensioned and measured from left to right horizontally and from bottom to top for vertical dimensions. Totally the opposite of what most of us mechanical designers dimension. We do linear horizontal dimensions from right to left, just as you would cut the part on the lathe from right to left. Now, on the mill, it varies, but we try to follow the structural guys way left to right.

 

[RJSakowski]

Just a little trivia that I believe has been lost in the last 40 years. As a left handed person I pick up on these things but did you know that the tape measure you buy in the tool stores now a days is a left handed ruler?

Back in the days of folding wooden rulers it was common to be able to purchase a left handed or right handed ruler. But for some reason, I don't know why, when the tool manufacturers went to these automatic tape measures they settled on making only left handed models.

How can you tell, you may ask. Or whats the difference? The difference is in which hand you hold the ruler, which hand you write with and do you want to see the numbers right side up or upside down. Take this test! So if you write with your right hand hold your pencil and grab your tape measure in your left hand and extend it naturally to the right. The numbers are upside down. So have you noticed that if you want the numbers to be right side up, you have to either switch hands that you hold your pencil with or cross your arms. Very awkward for the righty.

If your at a flea market or antique tool sale you may find some old wooden folding rulers that are right handed.

Anyway, that's my trivia for the day.

Russell

An interesting theory. I'm a lefty and I use the tape rule in either hand, depending upon what I am measuring. Where the tape rule is when I pick it up may also have something to do with which hand I use as well. But then, I'm comfortable reading the rule upside down or on it's side and I usually measure once, measure twice, and then write the number down after laying the rule down, if at all.

I asked my neighbor, who is a contractor and lives by his tape rule which hand he measured with. He is a lefty and uses his left hand almost exclusively and reads the rule upside down.

I would have thought that the reason would be that we read and write from left to right so numbers ascending from left to right would be more natural and once a so -designed rule became commonplace, it would become a defacto standard.

 

[Silverbullet]

See, that's why Chinese kids score so much better in math than kids in the U.S. They don't have to spend all of third and fourth grade teaching them how to work with fractions!

As soon as I learned decimal equivalents I converted all fractions to numbers in school made life easier . Even the teachers couldn't figure out how I was doing it bet your rash I didn't tell them .

 

[Silverbullet]

They sell or use to sell tape measures with the CTC marked along or on the back of the tape. I have one and a steel rule set up with the inch lines going both ways from center twelve inch to 0 to twelve inch made center finding easy on layouts.

 

[jim18655]

Tapes have the belt clip so it hangs on your right side. Kind of almost forces you to use your right hand to measure and left hand to write.

 

[4GSR]

As soon as I learned decimal equivalents I converted all fractions to numbers in school made life easier . Even the teachers couldn't figure out how I was doing it bet your rash I didn't tell them .

Used to do the same thing. Until the teachers made me do thing long hand and show your work! Of course, that blew their mind too!

 

[taycat]

When I was in grade school they said we'd convert to metric. All they did was convert to both. Now it takes twice as many rulers and wrenches and spare nuts and bolts to make or repair anything.

I have a question for our metric pals. Do you ever get so your able to recognize what size a bolt or nut is?

yes you do.
but work in both my 9 yr old boy had his homework rejected cos he did it in imperial measurements.
i complained to school and they graded it for him as didn't specify what measurements to use.
also teacher couldn't work out measurements as only knew metric.