In search of greater precision
I live a life that is free of rules, or rather rulers. Measuring sticks. When the only thing I’m likely to cut during a given day is a piece of very mild cheddar to be shared with my best friend, the idea of precision in the length of the cut is far from ten on the scale. So, when called upon to assist son #2 in the purchase of his first tool for the new career in mechanical engineering, I was surprised.
Actually, my role was to pay at the checkout, but that’s at the other end of the story. There are very few measurement tools around the basement. I seem to remember a micrometer in a small case; so old that the foam bed has blown away on an errant breeze. There are several tape measures, which may or may not have an imperial/metric profile. And there is a scale caliper that stuck to me once while walking through an undergraduate physics lab. In passing, what is the statute of limitations around here? But that’s a story for another time.
My son reassured me that I wasn’t going to be invited to the next measuring jamboree; we’d have to go shopping. I come from the Want To Be A Millionaire club. “Yes Meredith, I want to Skype a friend for this question”. The VOIP phone rang a few times, and I was able to ask the million dollar one. “How much should I spend?”
My learned friend replied, with the wisdom that comes with countless hours in front of a cutting tool, to not buy the expensive tools until the interest of the child has taken root. Go to the nearest hardware depot and purchase something that is made from metal, is digital, and has the terms accuracy, resolution and repeatiblity in the description. Eschew the brand Fisher-Price.
I can follow advice, and we now have a caliper that will allow me to accurately determine the average diameter of my individual hairs. Not that I intend to do so; I did that years ago, and they’re all too narrow to be checked easily with the ruler engraved on a pencil case. The micrometer kept jamming and pulling out graps, and nobody in my party circle cared much one way or another, other than interest on where I’d got the micrometer in the first place. What is that statute, again?
Since I’m now underwriting the next machinist in the family (the only machinist in the family) I’ll be anxious to learn more about the trade.
