What is the actual measurement of .4″ ( i.e., .25=1/4″, .5=1/2″, etc.). Is this easier that what I’m making it? What is the purpose of using this type of measuring system, rather than actual inches on a ruler? Thanks…
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I'm not sure I understand the question, but 0.4" = 4/10" = 2/5".
To the nearest 1/8": 0.4" ~ 3/8" = 0.375"
To the nearest 1/16": 0.4" ~ 7/16" = 0.438"
To the nearest 1/32": 0.4" ~ 13/32" = 0.406"
To the nearest 1/64": 0.4" ~ 13/32" = 0.406"
What is the purpose? It makes more sense! If someone tells me that something measures 43/64", I have no real feeling for what that means--I have to convert it to a decimal value first. But 0.672" I can grasp immediately.
Of course, it would be even better to go SI, and measure everything in millimetres.
-Steve
Thanks for the response. I'm following plans to route a .4 inch depth rabbit. I wasn't sure how to determined the depth with my router. Thanks again for any imput.
Tooln', there are two ways I approach this when on-the-fly in the shop. One is that I have a little card (found in a toolbox somewhere, probably auction junk) that has decimal conversions on it. I'll look it up real quick and take the fractional number that's closest. The other, for setup say, is to use my cheap digital calipers from Harbor Freight. Just roll it out to .400, lock it and use the tail to set up the bit.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Thanks again...big help!
I have a dial caliper that is calibrated in both 64ths and decimal inches. Quite handy for chcking depths of things like that.
Tool..... among other decimal tools, I have a 6" Starrett decimal scale I use just for the reason you have. When I go north for the summer, I volunteer in a senior center w/ a MASSIVE woodshop. The guys kid me for being too fussy, but after making jet engine parts for all them years it's what I'm used to.
James
While the Metric System has it's advantages don't think it fixes everything. It has issues because of the size of the comon units working with some things. I know a lot of places use half Degrees because they do not think that the temp works all that well.
And from a constrution point of view CM are to small and M are to big. (and no one uses the size in between)
So thier are down sides to it. As for understanding fractions if you used them a lot you would have a "Grasp" for them. My father (a retired machanic) can still tell you the size of a nut (1/2", 10mm, 12mm etc) just by looking at it.
Now go talk to those crazy civil engineers, they use 1/10 of a foot instead of inches!
Doug
Edited 12/14/2007 3:47 pm ET by DougMeyer
Millimeters - Mmmmmmm!
Lataxe, 69 & 19/64ths inches high and a waste of only 28 inches and 512/64ths.
Lataxe,
BG... 75 1/2" high....but 24" short for waist measurement ratio.
And how many stone?
P,
13 & 7/8ths stone of pure gristle, beef and tallow, arranged in a configurtion that pleases ladies everywhere (or so I tell myself, as I gaze lovingly in the mirror).
Lataxe, honed to perfection by hours of woodworking and some rose-coloured glasses.
Sounds like a ribeye. Maybe you need to eat better before you gaze in that mirror, else you'll soon start gnawing on yourself.
P,
Even now I am munching a chocolate cookie, one of a large box sent by grateful Monty the Pointer, who I have walked here and there. That he managed to buy and send them without eating the lot, despite the fact that the chocolate would have killed him, is astounding. He is a dinner-stealing dawg.
Of course, all that dawg-walking is why I am so slim, fit and good-looking. Also, I have welded them rosey specs to my nose.
Lataxe, who could easily be a male model, if he wanted.
Where can I buy one of those mirrors?Frosty"I sometimes think we consider the good fortune of the early bird and overlook the bad fortune of the early worm." FDR - 1922
Frosty,
I will sell you one of my magic mirrors, very cheap. Of course, you must make the spell also. This involves a great deal of internal chanting along the lines, "I am lovely".
Don't let lady-wimmin catch you at it, though, as their mocking laughter ruins the magic immediately.
Lataxe, an illusionist
I'll bet you have a heck of a time finding trousers in that size. :) Tom, who is too dang fat to list measurements"Notice that at no time do my fingers leave my hand"
Tom,
I like not to have to wear trousers but this is not wise as things may get caught in the machinery. Then there are the prood-wimmin of Galgate, who would have me taken-off for forceable retrouserment and a period of incarceration.
So, I wears nice colourful strides, intended for chef-persons in their kitchens but good for WW men in their sheds. Those I have on at present are decorated with red and green peppers, with hot chillies here and there. There are others with fish, japanese characters, capering monkeys and so forth.
Once one starts wearing the tame, fawn-coloured stuff, that is the end and soon one is sat dribbling in a chair and shouting, "Who are you!? What place is this"!?.
Lataxe, a fashionista
A metric world would be so much nicer, but in the mean time, use excel to make a SS with decimal equivalents for increments of 1/64 or 1/32 of an inch. I use my printed version often in combination with a dial caliper (marked in decimal inches).
I've attached a copy to this message.Recommending the use of "Hide Signatures" option under "My Preferences" since 2005
Steve: Sounds like you were involved in metal machining? I was for 35 years & use decimals a lot. Lets see, 43/64 is ????
James
I have done a fair bit of machining over the years, although my preference for decimal measurement isn't directly related to that.
There's nothing inherently wrong with binary measurement; it's really just a matter of the number of digits that one has to carry around--binary measurement requires about three times as many digits as decimal measurement. For example, to measure something to a precision of about 1/100 of an inch, you need two decimal digits (1/10 and 1/100), but you need six or seven binary digits (1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16, 1/32, 1/64, 1/128). It's just easier for our brains to keep track of a smaller number of digits, even though those digits take on a larger number of values (ten vs. two).
Cognitive scientists tell us that the optimum size of things like this is between five and seven--that's what our brains remember best. But I'm not going to advocate that we switch to a base-7 numbering system. ;-)
-Steve
Steve: Well put.
James
I agree, however, measurement systems aren't much of an issue for my woodworking, which involves reproductions not cabinetmaking, and certainly not patternmaking. Virtually nothing has to be measured to closer than about 1/16" and mostly 1/4" will work perfectly. No interchangable parts made by different workers or factories to be assembled.
It makes little difference most of the time whether a table rail is accurately 66 1/2" long. Often it could be 66 1/4" long without harm. What is important is that it's opposing rail is precisely the same length, not whether they are accurately some particular numerical specification. The way to achieve that is not to measure one and cut it, and then measure the second and cut it. The better way is to first one is measured and the second made to conform to it. The touch of fingers comparing whether the surfaces are flush on both ends gives results that to make numerically would call for highly precise and accurate measurement and cutting. Industrially that's the goal, and is feasible, but not so with one-off furniture building in a one man shop.
Similarly, mortise and tenon joints must mate quite closely, and the difference between too snug and too loose is not many thousands of an inch. But most of us don't get there by precise measurement, it is by cutting and trying and then adjusting in small increments.
That's why compasses, marking gauges and bevel guages are more important than rulers.
43/64 is ????Lookin' in my OLD Brown&Sharp book.. Turn the cutter knob a 'bit Clockwise' into the work! Go slow,, Stop the Screw Machine and check the work with a Microcometer.. If in question.. Call the BOSS over for two or more questions on why not to wake him up?
And, of course, you can get rulers with decimal inch markings on them. Machinist's scales are like that because that's what American machinists have been using decimal inches for a hundred years. (That's why we have the 22 and 45 caliber bullets -- .22" and .45".) And if you want a measuring tape with decimal inches, Lee Valley sells them on the web site. Oddly, they're not in the printed catalog.
Jamie,
The measuring tapes are obsolete and therefore no longer catalogued. They remain, however, in cyberspace.Chris @ flairwoodworks
"The measuring tapes are obsolete ..."
Can you tell me how a decimal tape is obsolete? My guess is that these tapes have not sold very well, so Lee Valley took them out of the printed catalog, which space equals cost. They continue to sell them on the web, where space is free.
Jamie,
Let me rephrase that. Lee Valley has discontinued the tapes.Chris @ flairwoodworks
Lufkin has a great tape measure with decimal inches, and fractions. The numbers are printed so they are "up" when you hold the tape and look towards the tip. Which makes them very easy to read no matter how you hold the tape. Last time I looked Lowes had them.
I design in decimal, it is just lots easier for me to work with than fractions. They always confused me. I have memorized the decimal equivalent of the common ones.
"Lufkin has a great tape measure with decimal inches, and fractions."
Lufkin does something odd. They put the tic marks on the tape in the fractional positions, and then print the decimal equivalents. That is, you see tics marked .125", .375", and .750". Machinists rules, and Lee Valley's tape, put the tics marks in decimal position -- like .1, .3, .6 and such. That's easier to use, IMHO.
22 and 45 caliber bullets -- .22" and .45"Leave it to the Military to make sense of this world?
Well, actually a 22 caliber bullet is normally .224 and a 45 caliber can be .451, .452, or .454 depending on which 45 caliber gun it is intended for. If you have a 44 caliber pistol the common bullet size is .429. And while the 38 special and the 357 Magnum pistol cartridges do not sound similar, the 357 Magnum is a lengthened 38 Special so the high pressure loads can not be used in an older 38 special revolver, but they share a common bullet diameter of .357. Even the 9 mm pistol cartridge is not a full 9 mm. 9 mm should be about .360", but the bullet is ..355 or 356.
It would be nice if everything followed a logical and orderly nomenclature but with humans involved "That ain't gonna happen!"
Bruce
I guess that is why the have Interstate Highways in Hawaii?????
And why Seven Eleven has locks on the doors even though they are open 24/7/365.
And then again when I was in the Army we had 8 inch, 5 inch, and many 155 mm self propelled guns.. ?? Damn.. They were all LOUD! Never saw any difference with the 5 inch and the 155mm except for the trouble they caused this old tank recovery mechanic!I hate WAR but I sure loved to see/hear a battery of 8 inch guns go off! You could even see the projectiles going across the sky if the light was right! OK so as a kid my brother and I also made our own firecrackers.. AND Mom let us do it! Sometimes I wonder if she was trying to get us out of her hair? And then again I LOVE my old wooden Stanley rule with 10's of a inch markings!Edited 2/29/2008 8:01 am by WillGeorge
Edited 2/29/2008 8:02 am by WillGeorge
Over the years, I have found the General 6" pocket scale to be one of the most useful measuring tools around. Decimal equivalents on the back of the scale. It is made in both Standard and Metric.
-Nazard
.4" is awfully close to 1 cm (.016"). Use a metric ruler?scale and cut it a hair light.
Easy, 6 Bobs
http://bobsrule.com/articles.htm
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