Obsolete Stuff

[Black_Fly]

I ran across this old engineer's scale, from my cartographic drafting days. I started hand drafting maps from pencil manuscripts to scribe coat, which could be used as a huge negative in the dark room to make copies onto photosensitive mylar, which could then be used for field blueprints. Back then, the finished scale was pre-determined, and civil engineering used feet per inch almost universally in the US. That changed with GIS systems and satellite technology. Anyway, each side of the scale is a different units per inch. So, if you had a 60 scale map (1"=60'), you could measure on the 60 face. Many engineering map products were 40-100 scale ones. The 20 scale face could be used for a 200 scale map measurements also just by multiplying by 10. This linear measurement helped locating objects from a grid system
.

Show me your obsolete tools and gadgets. There's a million of them, more every day.

 

[yknpdlr]

i have one of those triangular scales, as well as a couple of slide manual rules. I did not much have need to use the scale as intended, but I could not have lived in college without my faithful slide rule in the early 1970's. Within a short time, 4 function calculators became available, but at first, they sold for $800. Most waited for the $400 version. When the TI-59 first came out, I also waited until its price came down to around $400. That was a lot then, but I learned to efficiently program it on 3 inch magnetic card strips, with a maximum of 99 key steps. I programmed it to do spherical trig for calculations of celestial navigation and distance and angle measurements over the surface of the earth, when I was an AF flight navigator, all calculations programmed within 99 key press steps. I'm sure I still have all of that stuff, but deeply buried in boxes in the basement, I will not drag them out for show.

 

[Steve in Idaho]

I found my old slide rule recently while digging through storage. Might have to relearn how to use it just for fun.

Dad's engineering scale, still in its sleeve...


I'll see your scale and raise you a 6' ruler.


How about this stinky thing?

 

[dramey]

6’ rules and hand warmers are obsolete?

 

[sailsman63]

Still use the foldable ruler, and I'm young enough that they were mostly on the way out when I was a kid. Good, solid, high-contrast ruler with a defined end point is the best way I've found to set a cranky tablesaw fence.

Also have one of the triangle scales, perhaps a little newer than those pictured, from my dad's mechanical drafting classes. Scales range from 3" = 1' to 1/8" = 1'. Best for specing out mechanical parts, up through architectural drawings. I worked through some old textbook stuff in high school. Never used it directly in a professional sense, but it did affect how I approach planning and communicating about physical objects.

I picked up a slide rule many years ago at a garage sale just because I thought they were really cool. No practical use to me, though.

 

[ppine]

Yes. We used the engineers rule. And the architects rule. I have an undergrad degree in geography. When I started environmental consulting 53 years ago, we wrote reports with a pencil and an eraser. The calculators were Monroe and mechanical. My Dad was a slide rule man. Mechanical typewriters gave way to electric ones. We had a steno pool.

We had no graphics dept in those days. We did all our own graphics by hand. We would print and bind the reports and send them in the mail. I remember when I got Fax machines for our company in 1988. It was a big deal. I got fired from a company once because I complained that we should have computers to write reports on in 1989. The archaeologists had them but none of the other disciplines. We got on airplanes to meet with people in person.

In forestry we learned the old ways of plane table mapping with a staff compass and Jacob's staff. We could make contour maps if none were available. We could throw a surveyors chain. We learned to throw a diamond hitch, how to use dynamite and how to build log houses. We used an Abney level instead of clinometer.

In the field we used USGS maps. 7.5 minute quads were standard but in remote areas they were 15 minute quads. In Alaska there were no maps. We used aerial photography, ortho photo quads taken in stereo. With practice we could see in stereo without using a stereoscope. A compass was always in the vest. I carried a hand lens. There was no GPS and no cell phones. If you said to someone "I will meet you Tuesday in Coyote Canyon at 0800" you showed up.

 

[Steve in Idaho]

6’ rules and hand warmers are obsolete?

Most people would probably say so. I haven't used either for years - except to see if I still could. Dry chemical hand warmers are so much more convenient, safer, and they don't stink.

Good, solid, high-contrast ruler with a defined end point is the best way I've found to set a cranky tablesaw fence.

I hear ya. But my saw fence has its own very accurate scale.

 

[SouthernKevlar]

The question should be:
"If an item still works and is useful, is it truly obsolete?"
I still carry a compass even when I have a GPS with me. I don't consider the compass obsolete, but perhaps superseded; I know the compass will not run out of power.

 

[Steve in Idaho]

The question should be:
"If an item still works and is useful, is it truly obsolete?"
I still carry a compass even when I have a GPS with me. I don't consider the compass obsolete, but perhaps superseded; I know the compass will not run out of power.

The GPS is nice, but the compass is still mandatory, as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Dana]

I found my old slide rule recently while digging through storage. Might have to relearn how to use it just for fun.

Late 1970s, calculators were ubiquitous, but I still carried my slide rule to important exams... saved my butt once.

I'll see your scale and raise you a 6' ruler.

View attachment 152869

Still have one (Dad's) and still use it.

How about this stinky thing?
View attachment 152870

Got one of those too, in an inside pocket of my flying jacket it keeps me warm flying my open cockpit biplane in cold weather.

 

[yknpdlr]

I still carry a compass even when I have a GPS with me. I don't consider the compass obsolete, but perhaps superseded; I know the compass will not run out of power.

I will never consider a compass as obsolete. it is my primary navigation tool and will remain so, even though at times I do carry and use a GPS ( for SAR incident missions, canoe race navigation on a new complex river route). I consider the journey itself of my backcountry navigation skills using "primitive" map and compass skills as a primary goal.

Does anyone think aircraft pilots will ever consider the compass as permanently superseded and unnecessary due to new electronic technology? Consider the potential failure rate. At one time I learned Morse Code. now maybe I do consider that technology as obsolete. But on the other hand, as a military member, a similar technolgy the tap code alphabet grid used by POWs for commuication is something that is not and should not become obsolete.

How about this stinky thing?

I used to use those JON-E brand hand warmers in the 1960's. Fill with ligher fluid and sit on deer watch for hours on cold Adirondack days. I would put it in an inside breast pocket over my heart and it kept my blood warm all day. Only my toes ever got chilled in my boots with them sitting in the snow without moving. Diuring Boy Scout winter campouts, if you put one in your sleeping bag to keep warm you had to be careful not to lay on it or touch it or you could get a bad burn. The catylist wick often needed to be replaced. I think i still have one packed away, but the wick probably does not work. I can definitely call them obsolete, but I bet iet would still work if I had a new wick attachment.

 

[stripperguy]

I do a fair amount of finish carpentry...those folding rules are the best for precise, inside measurements.
Slide rules, yeah, I relied on them earlier in my career, they've been obsolete forever.
Three sided scales? Still useful for scaled, hand drawings.
CAD and 3D modeling software changed my working life for the better, but sometimes you still need a pencil sketch.

 

[yknpdlr]

This was my air navigation computer. it is a circular slide rule, among other flight calculation tools. The reverse side is used for wind drift angle calculations. I still have a couple of them with about 2000 flight hours of use on them, Definitely now obsolete as far as I am concerned.

 

[dramey]

I use a map and compass for my navigation tools (no batteries to go dead). As nice as the GPSs are, they are battery hogs. I would have to bring an obscene number of batteries for me to depend on GPS on a long canoe trip.

 

[tketcham]

Here's one that most people won't recognize. Well, ppine might...

 

[Steve in Idaho]

I use a map and compass for my navigation tools (no batteries to go dead). As nice as the GPSs are, they are battery hogs. I would have to bring an obscene number of batteries for me to depend on GPS on a long canoe trip.

Not really. If you restrict most units to their base function - displaying lat/lon while using a paper map - batteries last a very long time. Lighted screen, active mapping, track logging, etc - those are battery hogs.
But you can always carry a solar charger.


My concern with GPS units is their habit of suddenly dying permanently for no apparent reason. I've had two of them do that now (admittedly, older units).
My latest is supposedly "military grade". We'll see how that works out.

 

[Black_Fly]

Still use the foldable ruler, and I'm young enough that they were mostly on the way out when I was a kid. Good, solid, high-contrast ruler with a defined end point is the best way I've found to set a cranky tablesaw fence.

Also have one of the triangle scales, perhaps a little newer than those pictured, from my dad's mechanical drafting classes. Scales range from 3" = 1' to 1/8" = 1'. Best for specing out mechanical parts, up through architectural drawings. I worked through some old textbook stuff in high school. Never used it directly in a professional sense, but it did affect how I approach planning and communicating about physical objects.

I picked up a slide rule many years ago at a garage sale just because I thought they were really cool. No practical use to me, though.

Here's one that most people won't recognize. Well, ppine might...

View attachment 152921View attachment 152922

Plotting tool.

 

[tketcham]

Plotting tool.

Not sure what you mean by that.

 

[Steve in Idaho]

Three sided scales? Still useful for scaled, hand drawings.
CAD and 3D modeling software changed my working life for the better, but sometimes you still need a pencil sketch.

I took three years of architectural drawing in highschool. Just enough to realize it was not where I wanted to go in life (although it would likely have been more lucrative). Still have my folding drawing table and all the other primitive tools. I drag it all out occasionally to put a project design on paper if I need to pre-cut and transport before assembly, or I need to play with the design until it pleases me. I just did that last week for a cabinet addition in the extra room here. Guess I got some value from that introduction after all. I actually enjoy that process now since it doesn't have career implications. I hate working with CAD. Played with it for a bit, and was glad I don't have to.

 

[Steve in Idaho]

Here's one that most people won't recognize. Well, ppine might...

View attachment 152921View attachment 152922

Yup. Never seen one. What is it?