Rules are made to be broken
When is a rule not a rule? When it's four rules! This deceptively simple rolling ruler offers an unexpected "twist" on the conventional design. Made of what appears to be…
More patent sticks
Here is a trio of glorified wooden sticks for ruling parallel lines that each somehow managed to secure patent protection. Two are so similar that they could easily be mistaken…
Thornton on folding pocket rules
I recently took a gamble on a job lot of plastic slide rules and other oddments on account of a blurry pocket rule in one corner of the photo. Superficially…
Rotring Techniker-Zirkel II: Just when you thought it was safe to go back to the drawing board
The name Rotring will forever be synonymous with the tubular technical pens on which their business was built, so it easy to forget that they were also highly regarded for…
An English Lotter?
The other day I broke my own rule of not buying any more of those turn of the century imported student-quality sets sold in vast quantities, primarily by Jackson Brothers, but…
A nineteenth-century stencil set
Before the advent of CAD, laser printers, photocopiers and even that old favourite Letraset, stencil plates were widely used to apply standardised and decorative lettering to technical drawings. They were…
Stanley vulcanite scales
Today's post showcases a set of six W.F. Stanley vulcanite chain scales and matching offsets, something that had been on my wish list for a long time. Vulcanite (aka ebonite)…
The “Marvel” geometric compass
The Bennett "Marvel" Geometric compass is a classic example of the torturous development and ultimate failure of an overcomplicated solution to a problem that never really existed in the first…
How I gained 25 lbs and got the six-pack of my dreams!
Don't worry, this isn't another of those spam emails advertising protein shakes or the like. I'm talking weights. Ship weights. Admiralty pattern. These were the extremely heavy lead blocks (variously…
Galileo! Galileo!
Not to be confused with Galileo's compass, the Staedtler Galileo could be considered one of the last radical redesigns of the modern compass, literally turning the usual fine-adjustment spindle concept…