My mom still has a bunch of cool slide rules that were my dad's.
During WWII his batallion came across the abandoned and shut down K&E
plant. Of course, being an EE student, he filled up on them.

It's been a long time since I could use one but he sure could.

Jim

On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 7:08 PM, Scott Daniel - Turbovans
<scottdaniel@turbovans.com> wrote:
> 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
>