what calculates the slope of stairs, alone or in pairs

October 15, 2023 8:55 AM

Would you like to look at a truly boggling number of linear and circular slide rules, and related paraphernalia, on a website with a comfortingly 20th century aesthetic? Of course you would, which is why you should spend some time at The Oughtred Society's Archive of Collections.
posted by cortex (15 comments total)

Note that those of keen memory might remember seeing The Oughtred Society on the blue before: there were a couple posts to, inter alia, the main society page back in 2003 and 2006 respectively. But the actual Archive linked here, despite having solid 1995 academic web design vibes, only began to come into existence in 2015.
posted by cortex at 9:00 AM on October 15, 2023

I wish slide rules were easier to obtain because I wish I had a bunch like these people.
posted by ob1quixote at 10:17 AM on October 15, 2023

Oh hey, there's my father-in-law, the big nerd. I sent the page link to my wife thinking it was just a funny "same name" coincidence.
posted by Wetterschneider at 11:46 AM on October 15, 2023 [5 favorites]

I have a slide rule! It was my father's slide rule. My father who in the Sixties went to Oxford to do post-doctoral work in high temperature chemistry, with some kind of obtuse thesis publication title that you might expect, and I have the slide rule he used during his time there.

I have no idea how to use it, but I do also have the book on how to use it. So when civilization collapses and nobody can charge their phones anymore, I will have a calculator in my pocket, and you'll be happy to see me.
posted by hippybear at 11:49 AM on October 15, 2023 [3 favorites]

I have a bunch of old slide rules somewhere in the basement, mainly of the old Pickett magnesium(?)-aluminum low coefficient of thermal expansion alloy with eye-EZ yellow coating, but only one of the plastic laminate over bamboo K&E rules I now think are far more elegant.
posted by jamjam at 12:07 PM on October 15, 2023 [1 favorite]

When I was in Junior High School I bought a cheap slide rule for some reason, which had 22 scales on it, including log-log scales.
It had functions I didn't understand then, but it came in handy in college (1970) when everyone else bought new Picketts. I still have that one- it still works.
I also got 2 other slide rules off of eBay a decade or two ago.

The slide rule was a terrific invention, but not very useful these days, until we run out of power.
posted by MtDewd at 2:08 PM on October 15, 2023

I collected slide rules for awhile and still have quite a few. I will warn older folks that as your vision deteriorates (even with reading glasses), they can be hard to read.

There are many apps that emulate slide rules, however...
posted by wittgenstein at 4:17 PM on October 15, 2023

I attended high school and then college on the cusp of suddenly affordable calculators replacing slide rules so I never really mastered how to use one. I think someone showed me how to do square roots and that's about it. But I do recall there being a GIANT slide rule hanging over the chalk board in one of my classrooms in HS. I assume it was used for some AP math class where they gave students formal instruction in its use.
posted by Insert Clever Name Here at 5:29 PM on October 15, 2023

I may have bought the last slide-rule in Ireland in about 1974. I had cherished one all through my high-school career in England and had it lost/stolen sometime shortly after I came to College in Dublin. I was attached, I thought it was an essential tool for science, so I went round the corner and bought another. Not half so nice as my old Faber-Castell 50/82 but functional. Almost immediately the price of pocket calculators collapsed and slide-rules fell into the dustbin of history. So much so that very few people under the age of 50 will know what I am blithering on about.

Now here's the rub. You use the slide-rule in exactly the same way (and get the same answer!) whether you are multiplying 2 x 3 or 20 x 3 or 200 x 3 million. So you had to estimate the answer you expected before you started tricking about with the apparatus. When you read off the significant figures from the slide-rule, you knew whether you were talking 6 or 60 or 6/10ths of a billion. With the tools of more than 40 years ago, you knew how to ball-park, got experience in estimating and developed a feeling for numbers and magnitude. The calculator generation tend not to have this skill particularly well polished. The other great advantage is that you're not tempted to write down an answer like 3.1415926 for Pi, when 22/7 is good enough for your present purpose.
posted by BobTheScientist at 11:06 PM on October 15, 2023 [5 favorites]

I have my dad's old slide rule somewhere in my tools. (Second drawer down in the old green nightstand under the low-voltage/network wiring toolbag).

I *tried* to get my kids to memorize the multiplication tables up to 20 x 20 because once you have that down, using a slide rule gets a lot easier. They looked at me... sadly, like they always look at me...
posted by mikelieman at 5:13 AM on October 16, 2023 [5 favorites]

Not understanding in the slightest how to use a slide rule is one of my secret shames. I realized this morning, surely, YouTube can resolve this once and for all. Here is a nice vintage video explaining the slide rule for my MeFite siblings in ignorance.
posted by eirias at 6:18 AM on October 16, 2023 [1 favorite]

I have a 3m long slide rule that is ready in case I encounter any Big Math problems. The normal Pickett sliderule that it resembles is more accurate, although not as much fun.
posted by autopilot at 7:39 AM on October 16, 2023 [1 favorite]

autopilot, I remember one of those being present on some school wall in my youth, probably high school.

I used a slide rule a little bit in high school. I got a TI calculator for Christmas in my junior (11th grade) year, which my mom walked miles to buy. Prior to that I mostly used friends' calculators while in class. Currently I have a couple of nice slide rules that I found at thrift stores; I've never touched them since getting them, though. I should.
posted by neuron at 8:27 AM on October 16, 2023 [1 favorite]

I have a slide rule! It was my father's slide rule. I have a slide rule that was my Dad's. I think I used it to take college Trig, before I realized I didn't have the math background for a science degree, and probably wouldn't enjoy it. But I liked exercising that part of my brain for a bit. I recall a professor bringing a 4 function calculator to class and talking about how circuit boards and chips were going to change everything. I do like a bit of nerdy passion.
posted by theora55 at 8:05 PM on October 16, 2023

...whether you are multiplying 2 x 3 or 20 x 3 or 200 x 3 million.
That's why we used scientific notation. 2*10^x * 3*10^y. Add x and y, and depending on which side of the rule, maybe add 1 to the exponent.

In 1973 I was working a part-time job just before graduating from college. This place had a bunch of engineers, and I met a guy who was trying to sell 4-function calculators to them. They were selling for $100. Two years later you could get one for free by opening a bank account.
posted by MtDewd at 10:30 AM on October 18, 2023