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Date:         Fri, 2 Jul 2010 17:08:10 -0700
Reply-To:     Scott Daniel - Turbovans <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Scott Daniel - Turbovans <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM>
Subject:      Re: Pesky Oil Leak
Comments: To: mcneely4@cox.net
Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset="UTF-8"; reply-type=original

wow, have not heard the mention of K & E slide rules since college in Colorado in the 60's .

what really impressed me was seeing hard core engineering types walking around with 3 foot long slide rules.

logrythm tables ... such old tech !

the tricky part for me was keeping track of the decimal place. Getting the number was easy. I used to sit in an electronics class and use my slide rule to get what the next # was going to be quickly, faster than the teacher could do some basic calculation on the blackboard in 'longhand' ( is that the word ?) .. I'd know from the slide rule something would be say 7469 .. but not be sure if it was 7.469, or 74.69 etc.. but I could get the numbers quickly quickly with one.

now tell me ...is 'abacus' a Latin word ? seems like it would be, yet the abacus is an oreintal invention I believe. I should Wik it.

Hard to believe...I worked in a pizza resturant in Ft Collins CO in 1963 or 4 ... 65 cents an hour at first, working in the kitchen, like dishwasher. later moved up to cook, at $ 1.10 per hour. 8 hours work, .....9 bucks. wow. Somewhere in there fuel was about 23.9 cents a gallon.

In Denver in 1968, 2 dollars bought 8 gallons of fuel... enough to drive to the high jeep road passes and back .. a whole long day trip for 2 bucks in fuel.

and gas is really cheap considering all the effort to get the stuff, refine it, and ship it etc. .. even at 3 dollars a gallon. I am 'hoping' that the Gulf oil spill debacle will create a little awareness that the notion of 'the ecnomy' is backwards ..and that 'making more stuff' and burning more oil, and spending more more more ..does not in itself really produce wealth, or income, or food on the table. They just think it does. And they can't see beyond the silly notion of 'the economy' ....hey.....fly around in airplances burning up fuel and polluting the atmoshpere and planet ...that makes 'jobs' and makes everyone wealtheir ....that is plain backwards baby, and I knew that when I was 7 years old..... I rememer where I was standing when I thought that rents should not go up, that there should really only be one government on the whole planet etc. Humans have a long, long way to go, let's put it that way...........that is if they don't extinct themselves out first.

and we are so lucky to get to play with our vanagons actually. Just think how many people don't get to do simple pleasures like that, or even live very long.

ca-razy baby. Scott

----- Original Message ----- From: <mcneely4@cox.net> To: <vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM>; "Scott Daniel - Turbovans" <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM> Sent: Friday, July 02, 2010 3:12 PM Subject: Re: [VANAGON] Pesky Oil Leak

> ---- Scott Daniel - Turbovans <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM> wrote: >> What's a 'slide rule' ? >> bet you don't really have one. >> I haven't seen one in decades. > > I hold in my hands as I type this a Picket and Eckell, Synchro Scale, > Model N803-ES Log Log Speed Rule, Dual Base. I also have in front of me > Maurice L Hartung's _How to Use log log Slide Rules_, Picket and Eckel, > Chicago, 1953 along with the _Supplement to Log Log Manual M-14, How to > Use the Model 803 Log Log Dual Base Speed rule_ , also by Hartung. > > I bought this rule during my junior year in high school, 1961, from the > Science Department of Justin F. Kimball H.S. in Dallas, Texas. I don't > remember the price, but I do know that I paid it out at $1.10 per week. > The manual was 50 cents, as was the supplement, printed right on the > cover. > > The rule is aluminum, unlike the more expensive K&E rules, which were made > of bamboo. Cheaper rules were plastic. > > The Texas Interscholastic League, best known for its statewide athletic > competitions, sponsored academic contests. I competed in slide rule and a > couple of other events. In slide rule, I got so far as state > quarterfinals. > > The rule got me through college, where it was common to see engineering > and science students about campus with their leather cased rules hanging > from their belts (I carried mine that way). I didn't have an electronic > calculator until I was in graduate school, when a TI calculator with > engineering and statistical functions sold for around $200 (1970 dollars). > The same calculator today (Radio Shack or HP) can be had for under $20 > (2010 dollars). > > Periodically, I pull the rule out just to do a few calculations for the > hell of it. I can generally work about as fast with it as I can with a > calculator (if I write down intermediate results with the calculator, > which I usually do to be sure I've done the sequence correctly), and with > little difference in result. > > When my daughter was in elementary school, I pulled out the rule and > showed it to her (this was about 1982, calculators already ruled). She > was fascinated, and quickly learned the concept and utility of logarithms > (she was 9 years old). A physical model does wonders for comprehension. > > When has any one of you last done a basic calculation such as multiplying > two six digit, four decimal place numbers by taking the log of each number > from a table, adding the logs, and taking the antilog of the result > ............. ? > > > David McNeely


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