Willow Posted June 22, 2009 Share Posted June 22, 2009 OK, I know I am showing my age here, but does anyone remember using slide rules at school? And can one still buy them? We used them at High School, but my mother cannot remember what happened to mine. I was no scholar so maybe I tossed it away after finishing school! ;) Willow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jane in NC Posted June 22, 2009 Share Posted June 22, 2009 While slide rules are no longer made, there is a market for them on Ebay and the like. Slide rules are a common graduation gift for engineers or computer science people. (We gave the engineer who married my niece one from our slide rule stash--we have several. What a statement about us! :D) I may have posted this link on the old board, but this is a good time to offer it again. Go here for instructions on constructing your own slide rule. There are PDFs to print and some basic instructions for use. There are even PDFs for making a circular slide rule, something that I never owned. Have fun. Jane Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Orthodox6 Posted June 22, 2009 Share Posted June 22, 2009 Slide rules are sold at the link Jane posted. (I just ran a search and landed on that website.) I used a slide rule for high school physics. I sure hope my dad still has it in his garage ! While slide rules are no longer made, there is a market for them on Ebay and the like. Slide rules are a common graduation gift for engineers or computer science people. (We gave the engineer who married my niece one from our slide rule stash--we have several. What a statement about us! :D) I may have posted this link on the old board, but this is a good time to offer it again. Go here for instructions on constructing your own slide rule. There are PDFs to print and some basic instructions for use. There are even PDFs for making a circular slide rule, something that I never owned. Have fun. Jane Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TravelingChris Posted June 22, 2009 Share Posted June 22, 2009 I know my older brother used one in high school but he was six years older than me and eight years ahead in school. (He was accelerated one grade and was before the cutoff in the school district he started in.) I remembered seeing one but have no idea how they worked. I think I will look it up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willow Posted June 22, 2009 Author Share Posted June 22, 2009 Go here for instructions on constructing your own slide rule. There are PDFs to print and some basic instructions for use. There are even PDFs for making a circular slide rule, something that I never owned. Have fun. Jane What fun, thank you. I think my son will enjoy making one of these. Maybe I should buy a second hand one while they are still available! Willow Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jane in NC Posted June 22, 2009 Share Posted June 22, 2009 What fun, thank you. I think my son will enjoy making one of these. Maybe I should buy a second hand one while they are still available! Willow Our library book sale regularly has manuals on using slide rules. Another interesting item from the past that we see at these books sales are texts on drafting. With everyone using CAD programming, these books are considered obsolete, but we have acquired a few that we think are interesting. Luddites might want to also have drafting tools at their disposal. ;) Jane (proud owner of her father's antique compasses and drafting tools) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nan in Mass Posted June 22, 2009 Share Posted June 22, 2009 I have my grandfather's from Anapolis. They are beautiful. My oldest just took graphics and had to draw all the ship's systems. Luddites might be pleased to hear that he was taught to pace out the distances so he could draw them, and they only learned to draw with the computer after they had done a bunch of drawings by hand. My younger two have plastic school sets with dividers, etc. It was hard to find cheap ones and it seems like I've spent 8 years fussing at them not to lose the pieces or sit on the boxes or throw their backpacks and crack them. Sigh. If I had known that they would manage to hang onto them for eight whole years, I would have bought them nice ones to begin with, especially since Singapore requires constructions. Fortunately even cheap as they were, they worked reasonably well. I HATE bad compasses. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kathy in MD Posted June 23, 2009 Share Posted June 23, 2009 Our library book sale regularly has manuals on using slide rules. Another interesting item from the past that we see at these books sales are texts on drafting. With everyone using CAD programming, these books are considered obsolete, but we have acquired a few that we think are interesting. Luddites might want to also have drafting tools at their disposal. ;) Jane (proud owner of her father's antique compasses and drafting tools) If you think the drafting tools are great, you'e got to see the truly old blue prints! The lettering on them were works of art. And the line work wasn't bad either. I would have loved to have been able to take some that I used home and hang them on my walls. But the ones I used at work still represented standing buildings, so I couldn't take them home. And then the original drawings were probably done on real linen. At my first job, the engineer still used starched linen for all his highway and bridge drawings. It was old-fashion even then, but fun to work on. And I got to take the linen scraps home, wash them and use the linen. Back to the OP, you should see the gorgeous metal slide rule I won at the state science fair as a senior. The next year they awarded calculators. and of course all my engineering classes required calculators. I never had a chance to use my good slide rule. BTW, I'm old!!!!!:D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tedearly Posted June 24, 2009 Share Posted June 24, 2009 Howdy, You brought back memories of my dearly departed father, a mechanical engineer, who held on to his slide rule for me when I went into engineering. 1980 was my freshman year, TIs with red LEDs were the thing, so I never learned how to use it, and eventually, the slide rule disappeared. I regret not learning on a slide rule and also not taking a class in civil engineering. OT. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Storm Bay Posted June 24, 2009 Share Posted June 24, 2009 If you think the drafting tools are great, you'e got to see the truly old blue prints! The lettering on them were works of art. And the line work wasn't bad either. I would have loved to have been able to take some that I used home and hang them on my walls. But the ones I used at work still represented standing buildings, so I couldn't take them home. BTW, I'm old!!!!!:D My aunt was a draftsman (I haven't heard the term luddite before--but she drew up blue prints by hand for architects) back in the 1960s and 1970s. I'm not sure if you mean older than that or not, but it was all done by hand. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kathy in MD Posted July 1, 2009 Share Posted July 1, 2009 My aunt was a draftsman (I haven't heard the term luddite before--but she drew up blue prints by hand for architects) back in the 1960s and 1970s. I'm not sure if you mean older than that or not, but it was all done by hand. Nope, that's recent stuff :001_smile: I'm talking about the draftmen around 1915. That stuff was gorgeous. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Susan C. Posted July 1, 2009 Share Posted July 1, 2009 I have one somewhere that was my dad's (he was an engineer). But I have homeschooled all the way through, and never heard a slide rule mentioned, and we went through precalc. and physics! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Storm Bay Posted July 1, 2009 Share Posted July 1, 2009 Nope, that's recent stuff :001_smile: I'm talking about the draftmen around 1915. That stuff was gorgeous. I thought you might mean something older, because I remember hand drawn blueprints from the 1960s and 1970s and they weren't beautiful. Very well done, but not what you had described. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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