I've seen plenty of paper/cardboard calculators for all sorts of things, but
this weekend I ran across a "real" slide rule put out by a hydraulics
company with a couple of scales added for calculating hydraulic/pneumatic
stuff

it's pictured here on ebay ---
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...m=300289178419

What I'm wondering, since this is the first of this style that I've seen, is
how common was this? Most folks I know who were engineers in the 50s had a
Pickett or K&E slide rule, so I'm kind of surprised that anyone would
actually do much with this, but maybe it was aimed at non-engineers?

--
Bill
www.wbnoble.com

On 2009-01-26, Bill Noble wrote:
I've seen plenty of paper/cardboard calculators for all sorts of things, but
this weekend I ran across a "real" slide rule put out by a hydraulics
company with a couple of scales added for calculating hydraulic/pneumatic
stuff

it's pictured here on ebay ---
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...m=300289178419

I see that you've caved in to eBays "paypal only" approach.

What I'm wondering, since this is the first of this style that I've seen, is
how common was this? Most folks I know who were engineers in the 50s had a
Pickett or K&E slide rule, so I'm kind of surprised that anyone would
actually do much with this, but maybe it was aimed at non-engineers?

This was probably aimed at people who did purchasing of the
hydraulic cylinders and supplies, to free them from having to ask the
engineers to do all the calculations when they have questions. These
would have been people who knew how to use a sliderule, but who did not
carry the various formulae and constants around in their heads, so the
GAL and DIA scales helped them come up with quick answers.

Enjoy,
DoN.

--
Email: | Voice (all times): (703) 938-4564
(too) near Washington D.C. | http://www.d-and-d.com/dnichols/DoN.html
--- Black Holes are where God is dividing by zero ---

"DoN. Nichols" wrote in message
...
On 2009-01-26, Bill Noble wrote:
I've seen plenty of paper/cardboard calculators for all sorts of things,
but
this weekend I ran across a "real" slide rule put out by a hydraulics
company with a couple of scales added for calculating hydraulic/pneumatic
stuff

it's pictured here on ebay ---
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...m=300289178419

I see that you've caved in to eBays "paypal only" approach.

actually, that wasn't intentional - if anyone asks if they can pay by
another (legit) method, I always say "fine, no problem" - I hadn't noticed
anything, but not that you point it out, I'll look - it think what happened
is that they just took away the other options. --- I just checked, and that
is in fact what they did - there is no option for "money order" or "check"
or "cash", only paypal, propay (whatever that is) and merchant credit cards.

What I'm wondering, since this is the first of this style that I've seen,
is
how common was this? Most folks I know who were engineers in the 50s had
a
Pickett or K&E slide rule, so I'm kind of surprised that anyone would
actually do much with this, but maybe it was aimed at non-engineers?

This was probably aimed at people who did purchasing of the
hydraulic cylinders and supplies, to free them from having to ask the
engineers to do all the calculations when they have questions. These
would have been people who knew how to use a sliderule, but who did not
carry the various formulae and constants around in their heads, so the
GAL and DIA scales helped them come up with quick answers.

Enjoy,
DoN.

Have you seen any of these things before? You may be right, but all I'd
seen before was the paper/cardboard items.

Bill Noble wrote:
I've seen plenty of paper/cardboard calculators for all sorts of things, but
this weekend I ran across a "real" slide rule put out by a hydraulics
company with a couple of scales added for calculating hydraulic/pneumatic
stuff

it's pictured here on ebay ---
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...m=300289178419

What I'm wondering, since this is the first of this style that I've seen, is
how common was this? Most folks I know who were engineers in the 50s had a
Pickett or K&E slide rule, so I'm kind of surprised that anyone would
actually do much with this, but maybe it was aimed at non-engineers?


I was an electro-optical guy. One of the gadgets we all sought were the
GE "black body" slide rules. You called a GE industrial rep and asked
for one. They had a number of very complex functions, which in some
cases were transcendental equations, very hard to work even with a slide
rule or set of tables.

It was formally called the Radiation Calculator, courtesy of the
Aerospace Electronics Department.

For instance, you could pick two IR wavelengths, and a temperature, and
calculate the power emitted from a surface. It would do units
conversion, find the wavelength of peak emission for a given temp, and a
few other goodies. It also had printed on it a number of constants used
in physics computations.

In the days before desktop computers it was certainly a big aid.

On Jan 25, 11:37*pm, "Bill Noble" wrote:
"DoN. Nichols" wrote in message

...

On 2009-01-26, Bill Noble wrote:
I've seen plenty of paper/cardboard calculators for all sorts of things,
but
this weekend I ran across a "real" slide rule put out by a hydraulics
company with a couple of scales added for calculating hydraulic/pneumatic
stuff

it's pictured here on ebay ---
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...e=STRK:MESELX:....

I see that you've caved in to eBays "paypal only" approach.

actually, that wasn't intentional - if anyone asks if they can pay by
another (legit) method, I always say "fine, no problem" *- I hadn't noticed
anything, but not that you point it out, I'll look - it think what happened
is that they just took away the other options. *--- I just checked, and that
is in fact what they did - there is no option for "money order" or "check"
or "cash", only paypal, propay (whatever that is) and merchant credit cards.







What I'm wondering, since this is the first of this style that I've seen,
is
how common was this? *Most folks I know who were engineers in the 50s had
a
Pickett or K&E slide rule, so I'm kind of surprised that anyone would
actually do much with this, but maybe it was aimed at non-engineers?

This was probably aimed at people who did purchasing of the
hydraulic cylinders and supplies, to free them from having to ask the
engineers to do all the calculations when they have questions. *These
would have been people who knew how to use a sliderule, but who did not
carry the various formulae and constants around in their heads, so the
GAL and DIA scales helped them come up with quick answers.

Enjoy,
DoN.

Have you seen any of these things before? *You may be right, but all I'd
seen before was the paper/cardboard items.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Material of construction was a matter of cost..and purpose.

Freebies to the customers were cheap paper/cardboard.

Slide rules that your employees might use to design product were
better built.

If the type of slide rule was useful to the discipline, it was mass
produced or commissioned by a company.

TMT

"DoN. Nichols" wrote in message
...
On 2009-01-26, Bill Noble wrote:
I've seen plenty of paper/cardboard calculators for all sorts of things,
but
this weekend I ran across a "real" slide rule put out by a hydraulics
company with a couple of scales added for calculating hydraulic/pneumatic
stuff

it's pictured here on ebay ---
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...m=300289178419

I see that you've caved in to eBays "paypal only" approach.

After wasting months trying to recover money from lost money orders (buying)
and having people tell me the check is in the mail (selling) etc... YES.
The only exception when I sell is if the person picks the item up and hands
me cash. Paypal sucks when it comes to dispute resolution, but they do a
good job of transferring money.

"Bill Noble" writes:

I've seen plenty of paper/cardboard calculators for all sorts of things, but
this weekend I ran across a "real" slide rule put out by a hydraulics
company with a couple of scales added for calculating hydraulic/pneumatic
stuff

it's pictured here on ebay ---
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...m=300289178419

What I'm wondering, since this is the first of this style that I've seen, is
how common was this? Most folks I know who were engineers in the 50s had a
Pickett or K&E slide rule, so I'm kind of surprised that anyone would
actually do much with this, but maybe it was aimed at non-engineers?

I believe they were pretty common, especially in engineering-ish
industries. I've got several of them, some from clients of my dad's
(he was a business consultant) and some from other sources. I expect
it was the 1960s equivalent of the modern too-small-to-be-useful USB
stick with a corporate logo on it.

Bill Noble wrote:
I've seen plenty of paper/cardboard calculators for all sorts of things, but
this weekend I ran across a "real" slide rule put out by a hydraulics
company with a couple of scales added for calculating hydraulic/pneumatic
stuff

it's pictured here on ebay ---
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...m=300289178419

What I'm wondering, since this is the first of this style that I've seen, is
how common was this? Most folks I know who were engineers in the 50s had a
Pickett or K&E slide rule, so I'm kind of surprised that anyone would
actually do much with this, but maybe it was aimed at non-engineers?

Most all pilots still learn how to use an E6B:

http://www.sportys.com/terryc/images/7205l.jpg

It lets you solve virtually all the math problems
related to flight; fuel consumption, airspeed/
groundspeed, wind vectors and more. No batteries
to change, no electronics to fail.

"Jim Stewart" wrote in message ...
Bill Noble wrote:
I've seen plenty of paper/cardboard calculators for all sorts of things, but
this weekend I ran across a "real" slide rule put out by a hydraulics
company with a couple of scales added for calculating hydraulic/pneumatic
stuff

it's pictured here on ebay ---
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...m=300289178419

What I'm wondering, since this is the first of this style that I've seen, is
how common was this? Most folks I know who were engineers in the 50s had a
Pickett or K&E slide rule, so I'm kind of surprised that anyone would
actually do much with this, but maybe it was aimed at non-engineers?

Most all pilots still learn how to use an E6B:

http://www.sportys.com/terryc/images/7205l.jpg

It lets you solve virtually all the math problems
related to flight; fuel consumption, airspeed/
groundspeed, wind vectors and more. No batteries
to change, no electronics to fail.


Probably also the case with Celestial Navigation. Likely some were sight reduction tables that
would get one within a few dozen miles if caught in a lifeboat with only a sextent. I have not seen
such a device, though. I do have some good books on Celestial dating from a 1930 Bowditch to one
called The Calculator Afloat. The reason I thought of "sight reduction" is bacause it is tabular -
the kind that lends itself to quickie shortcuts like cardborard calculators.

Bob Swinney

Bob Swinney

On 2009-01-26, Bill Noble wrote:

"DoN. Nichols" wrote in message
...
On 2009-01-26, Bill Noble wrote:
I've seen plenty of paper/cardboard calculators for all sorts of things,
but
this weekend I ran across a "real" slide rule put out by a hydraulics
company with a couple of scales added for calculating hydraulic/pneumatic
stuff

it's pictured here on ebay ---
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...m=300289178419

I see that you've caved in to eBays "paypal only" approach.

actually, that wasn't intentional - if anyone asks if they can pay by
another (legit) method, I always say "fine, no problem" - I hadn't noticed
anything, but not that you point it out, I'll look - it think what happened
is that they just took away the other options. --- I just checked, and that
is in fact what they did - there is no option for "money order" or "check"
or "cash", only paypal, propay (whatever that is) and merchant credit cards.

O.K. I think "ProPay" is an alternative service like PayPal, so
they can claim that they aren't shutting out *all* other ways other than
their own PayPal.

[ ... ]

This was probably aimed at people who did purchasing of the
hydraulic cylinders and supplies, to free them from having to ask the
engineers to do all the calculations when they have questions. These
would have been people who knew how to use a sliderule, but who did not
carry the various formulae and constants around in their heads, so the
GAL and DIA scales helped them come up with quick answers.

[ ... ]

Have you seen any of these things before? You may be right, but all I'd
seen before was the paper/cardboard items.

I've owned and used cheap printed on wood slide rules, but not
custom ones like this -- just the cardboard ones -- some of which are
nomograms/nomographs, and others real (if limited functionality) slide
rules.

Enjoy,
DoN.

--
Email: | Voice (all times): (703) 938-4564
(too) near Washington D.C. | http://www.d-and-d.com/dnichols/DoN.html
--- Black Holes are where God is dividing by zero ---