Engineers probably get abused a little here on this message board.?ÿ But I'll be the first to congratulate the team that put this together.
The equipment to make this possible is truly amazing.
Wow! that was good. I really don't think engineers here are "abused", just because they all "snort" when they laugh is not something to tease them about. ?????ÿ
Did someone say it??s engineer joke Friday?!?!!!! Here! Let me start!!!!!
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j/k
I became a surveyor because engineers need heroes.
I was a weird kid.?ÿ I used an abacus a lot?ÿ
I found this weird and expensive looking and heavy ruler in my dad's desk.
He walked me through what is was and taugjt me how to use it.
Fast forward about 16 years later...
Im in physics lab and it's using a slide rule to appreciate how we got to the moon 21 years prior.
Besides the prof, i was the only one whom knew how to use it.
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Math rocks.?ÿ Tools that make math less painful are the marrow of life.
@jitterboogie Wow, so around 1990; that was pretty late for a slide rule! In 1981 or 1982, which was already rather late, the older professor for my Aero/Astro control systems course carried a slide rule in his pocket and would use it while giving lectures. I think it was largely for show; in his office, he used a Hewlett-Packard handheld calculator.
It was just a lab, to appreciate the advancement of technology.?ÿ
I still have my brother's 48sx with MechEng equation card and another memory card and the coolest part is that it was MADE IN USA(Corvallis Oregon in fact), stamped proudly on the back.?ÿ Yeah. We used to make almost everything amazing in the world at one point.
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Somewhere in a box in the attic I have my old slide rule.?ÿ I can probably use the C, CI and D scales but that's about it.?ÿ I had to take a quarter long course in slide rule when I started Engineering School.?ÿ Of course we had a quarter long course in Fortran too.
Andy
8th grade Science Class, 1973. Slide Rules were passed out and we all spent an hour with them. I managed to successfully perform some simple addition and multiplication before the class was up. At the end of the hour they were collected never to be seen again and that is my entire life's experience with slide rules.?ÿ
@norman-oklahoma:?ÿ If you think you did addition on a slide rule you made the same mistake I did when I got one for my 13th birthday.
I put the left index on 2 on the D scale and the slider on 2 on the C scale and voila!?ÿ 2 plus 2 equals 4.
@jitterboogie:?ÿ The left index on 2 on the D scale gives you 2 squared on the A scale. (And 0.996 on the LLo scale, 0.67 on the LLoo scale, 11?ø35' on the S scale, 11?ø20' on the T scale...)
I spent one Thanksgiving dinner at the home of my daughter-in-law's relatives, none of whom I had ever met before.?ÿ The subject of the moon landing came up and I recalled that we put men on the moon with slide rules.?ÿ One of the younger men, a mechanical engineering student at the time, asked, "what's a slide rule?"!?ÿ Since I kept one in the glove box of my truck I went out and got it and showed it around.?ÿ They were dazzled.
I used that same slide rule once to check my miles-per-gallon after filling up at a gas station on Highway 10 at the California/Arizona border. Some guy came over to my side of the truck and said, "I'll bet you and I are the only two who know how to use one of those!"?ÿ I should have said, "And I'm not too sure about you."
I have my Dad??s slide rule. Figured out how to multiply on it.
To be fair, I definitely didn't memorize the tool.?ÿ I suppose someday when my Dad passes, I'll have it again, and will indeed use it, just to keep the glides in working order.
Its pretty swift that when they made these, they covered lots of different methods of Math: Accounting, Stats, physics and engineering, etc etc.
People tout everyday the whole "design and innovation" movement. These things were the best game in town for nearly 350 years, came in various sizes and abilities, were round and even worn on watches.?ÿ Sure Pulsar made the first calculator watch and Casio mass produced it,?ÿ but rotating the bezel of a fine time piece to calculate the time and distance before fuel starvation and then parachute is retro cool....Excuse me as I make my departure in my Raspy DB-6....?ÿ Ciao!?ÿ
I??d like the nuclear half life circular slide rule.
After our big 2008 flood here, the Czech and Slovak museum was moved to higher ground.?ÿ ?ÿ We have a large population who trace to immigrants from that area.
Supposedly one of the largest buildings so moved. Here's a time lapse movie.
And a 10-minute news feature on it.
Slide rules are not typically used for addition and subtraction, but it is nevertheless possible to do so using two different (tricky) techniques.?ÿ It's amazing they were invented in 1630 and were the go to device for quick calculations until the early 1970s.?ÿ They were a great teaching tool in that you had to mentally approximate the correct answer to know where to place the decimal point.
I had a sweet bamboo slipstick in high school which I was pretty adept with but never used one for surveying, not enough significant figures.?ÿ Crazy but high quality bamboo slide rules prior to the 40s are worth hundreds and 7' long classroom rules in good shape are around $1,000 nowadays.?ÿ