Slide Rules

[Katharine]

Is 'Run a slide rule over it' supposed to be trendy speak now? (I heard it today as part of a trail for tomorrow's coverage of the Cuts on R4)

As someone who can actually use a slide rule and still has one, I wince when I hear it. I imagine many think they can do everything calculators can, they can't do addition and subtraction. You have to know what you are doing when using one, as you have to work out where the decimal point goes in the answer.

I did not use a slide rule at CH, I learnt later, when in Ghana I taught using one, and we had a 6 foot one for demonstration purposes. It was quite a feat manipulating it over your head!

[midget]

My boss always referred to a slide rule as a guessing stick. I think we have one tucked away at home, and a couple of weeks ago we had a few in the Hospice shop. I think I was the only person there who knew what they were and how to use them.

I have a faint memory of Miss Bushell (physics) teaching us how to use one.

[englishangel]

My husband used one at Uni. and one of his mates had the first calculator I ever saw, I think it was £25.00 (1973), I never learned though, and I doubt he could use one now, I'll ask him when he comes back from the footie.

[sejintenej]

Mine lives in my desk drawer and I've just got it out. I used it for my last two years at CH though it wasn't allowed in exams.

Early this year I got taught how to use a soroban (a form of abacus) by a Japanese specialist teacher - WOW!!!!!
She and a class of her UK primary school pupils have been on TV. Some older ones had moved on from the abacus to anzan (using an imaginary abacus) doing 5 figure by 5 figure multiplication and division in their heads as quickly as it can be done on a calculator. Sorobans seem to cost about a quid (mine is smaller and must be pence) but the schools decided to drop teaching even though her services were free and took an hour a week..
It is so simple and logical but no way can I hope to be as fast as those 10 year olds.

[Katharine]

I've seen Japanese doing that finger calculation, but didn't know its name. I have also seen skilled Chinese using the abacus.

has anybody else heard (or read) reference to slide rules recently?

[englishangel]

Husband says 'give me an hour to work it out'.

[sejintenej]

Husband says 'give me an hour to work it out'.

I have scales 1.1 to 2.9 on the top edge and 2.6 to 40,000 on the bottom edge I have never understood or used; is it cosines - I have tangents and sines in the centre? Whilst he is about it, mine has 3 marked constants; pi at +/- 3.142 (I know that one) but what are "g" at about 3.21 and "u" at 2.3?

[NEILL THE NOTORIOUS]

I had only just managed to understand the Slide-rule --- Post CH--when the Calculator arrived.
I think I still have a Slide-rule tucked away somewhere, and also a CIRCULAR version --- which I never DID understand !

[Kim2s70-77]

I learned to use a slide rule at CH - along with the (now obsolete??) log tables. Can't say I've had much use for it since, however.

[J.R.]

Oh, the joys of slide rules and log tables at CH.

Now just about obsolete with scientific calculators readily available !

[midget]

And when the batteries run down and you do not have any spares?

[englishangel]

I have the use of several calculators at work and at home and all of them are photo-voltaic and I have never replaced a battery.

[sejintenej]

I have the use of several calculators at work and at home and all of them are photo-voltaic and I have never replaced a battery.

They don't always use very much power; mine (a fairly basic Casio Financial) is on (I think) it's third battery. I used it all constantly at work and even now I use it most days though not heavily. I must have bought it in the mid 1970's and it still works fine though it is a little dirty. My son got through photo-voltaic calculators almost monthly

[englishangel]

Ah, but he's a boy!

[sejintenej]

. My son got through photo-voltaic calculators almost monthly

EnglishAngel wrote:

Ah, but he's a boy!

Compared to me, yes, but he already had a PhD and had lectured in the USA and Norway