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For those of a certain age …..

 
master steward
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I stumbled on my Post slide rule.  For more seconds than I care to admit, I was worried because it was a little swollen, and I couldn’t get it to work.
In my favor, I did not go looking to see if I could buy a new one.
 
rocket scientist
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Ha, John;
We could store our slide rules in our manual transmission cars (maybe even a 3 on the tree shift)
Another skill sliding into the past.
I could not help myself... I looked to see if you can purchase a slide rule!
Indeed you can!
However, my search for a modern column shift car has come up empty.
61poQx8p5pL._SX522_.jpg
[Thumbnail for 61poQx8p5pL._SX522_.jpg]
 
John F Dean
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OK. I got curious. $250.00 on e-Bay for a Post Versilog.  I am going to get this sucker working. It’s a virtual gold mine!


I suspect this is not a representative figure.  
 
John F Dean
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Hi Thomas,

I forget exactly when it was. But, in the past 20 years I tried to buy a new vehicle with a 4 speed. There was an up charge to go from an automatic to a 4 speed. Of course, that was not a column shift.

Do not assume that simply because I found the darned thing that I remember how to use it.   I do remember that it multiplies and divides by adding and subtracting logs.  But, that is as far as I go at the moment.  In the ultimate irony, I may have to use Google to figure out how to use the thing.
 
steward & bricolagier
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Hm. Wonder where mine is?
Packed down in a box someplace, I know I wouldn't have gotten rid of it.

I also hoard solar calculators. The one on my desk came out of a dumpster by the university in the early 80's, and still works wonderfully. It was in my purse for many years. It's had a hard life :D
 
pollinator
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When we moved house last year I came across mine, bought for school when I was about 12 I think. I showed it to my sons who are in their late 20s and they didn't know what it was. I really have no idea how to use it now!
 
gardener
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Before the slide rule, there was Gunter's rule. It usually only had one scale with the logarithm. You used dividers to multiply or divide on that scale.

Gunter's Rule at History of Computing
 
thomas rubino
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And Then there is Murphys Law
Anything that can go wrong Will go wrong...
Just saying
 
pollinator
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My slide rule was a metal Pickett. In those days, the proud mark of the science and engineering students was striding across campus with that big 'ol slide rule scabbard hanging on your belt. The freshman courses included a half-hour credit of "slide rule operation". Unfortunately, all students were expected to have purchased a Post Versalog from the college bookstore -- the Pickett was laid out slightly different, causing me confusion on some of the lessons.

The next level of confusion happened a year or two later when those awesome HP-35 scientific calculators became available. Students were now performing calculations done to multi-decimal accuracy while the answers in the back of textbooks were still in slide-rule accuracy -- "what am I doing wrong? I keep getting 5.83 joules but the book says 5.8 joules."
 
gardener
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thomas rubino wrote:And Then there is Murphys Law
Anything that can go wrong Will go wrong...
Just saying


And O'Tool's second rule of everything: "Murphy was an optimist"
I just missed out on having to use a slide rule in Technical Drawing and Industrial Arts at school and still cannot do log maths to save myself - Thank Mr Google that I can look up tables!!
 
gardener
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I was invented after the integrated circuit chip, and I would like to thank y'all for making me feel not so old anymore.
 
Dc Stewart
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Danged whippersnappers! We went to all the trouble of inventing those IC chips in hopes that you'd take them and advance humanity to a higher level. And what do we get? Obsession with selfies, pointless memes and AI-generated stuff! By gawds, in my day we had vision and hope!

...old-guy rant slowly tapers off to incoherent grumbling as the meds kick in...
 
Jordan Holland
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Dc Stewart wrote:Danged whippersnappers! We went to all the trouble of inventing those IC chips in hopes that you'd take them and advance humanity to a higher level. And what do we get? Obsession with selfies, pointless memes and AI-generated stuff! By gawds, in my day we had vision and hope!

...old-guy rant slowly tapers off to incoherent grumbling as the meds kick in...



K boomer.



jk
 
The only cure for that is hours of television radiation. And this tiny ad:
the permaculture bootcamp in winter (plus half-assed holidays)
https://permies.com/t/149839/permaculture-projects/permaculture-bootcamp-winter-assed-holidays
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