N scale ruler

[bc6]

Sorry for the glare on the ruler. 

 

 

[cteno4]

I assume that is 1/160 us/euro n scale, not 1/150 Japanese n scale, correct?

 

if not 1/150 there is a nice one at hlj for $2.50 tha has feet and meters, but sadly $25 to ship these days!

 

https://www.hlj.com/1-150-scale-scale-ruler-thdtsd00254

 

I’ve not seen these other places sadly, three sheeps design makes good stuff. I got a pile of these one xmas for all our club members when shipping was cheap. Wish they made a bigger one.

 

you can get 1/150 metric architects scales, but unfortunately not imperial.

 

printable ones also

 

https://www.blocklayer.com/scale-rulereng

 

jeff

[Doddy]

German engineering...

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B06XH2245Z/ref=ox_sc_saved_title_2?smid=A2S899HJEY8C60&psc=1

Edited July 27, 2023 by Doddy

[cteno4]

Yeah a ton of architectural scales with 1/150 in metric it’s finding one in imperial that I’ve not found. Imperial architecture scales are all based on usual fractions of an inch unfortunately.

 

jeff

[maihama eki]

The older thread on this topic.

 

 

Edited July 27, 2023 by maihama eki

[bc6]

I goofed up and got a 6" ruler when I wanted a 12" ruler. Oh well back to the drawing board.

[cteno4]

@maihama eki thanks was looking for that, but using ruler not rule to search!

 

@bc6 is your rule 1/160 or 1/150?
 

jeff

[bc6]

@cteno4 the ruler is 1:160.

[cteno4]

For your longer ruler just use a mm ruler and divide by half, that will only be big by 1.6%. I’ve found this close enough and for smaller stuff like buildings well within small measurement error. On bigger distances you rarely need super precise measurements anyway. You just need to remember to divide measurements taken by 2 and when marking stuff out multiply feet wanted by 2.
 

Using 1/160 rule puts your measurements 6.67% fat on your Japanese 1/150 scale stuff.

 

most all of Japanese is 1/150 scale (buildings, vehicles trains) except shinkansens that are 1/160 to be scale with n gauge track and a few steamers that seem to be in the 1/140s maybe to make them look better with cape gauge tracks.

 

one of the little gotchas with Japanese n scale…

 

really mm is about the smallest you can easily read on an etched ruler. I have a half mm and 1/64 laser engraved machinist rulers but those really take squinting at and are easy to screw up your readings. I always have to check myself with a second reading, but rarely do I need to get to that fine a measurement on hobby and shop stuff.

 

I really wish they made a smart Bluetooth digital caliper that had its app being able to apply a scale to it! Would be grand to be able to have an old phone or cheapo android on the bench to display reading big in whatever desired scale on a digital caliper. Or just a feature on the digital caliper that let you set a scale on the caliper readout. But until then I usually just use 2mm per foot rule as I’m always misplacing the little three sheep’s design 1/150 ruler as it’s tiny and hides really easily!

 

jeff

[tossedman]

Jeff, they make the Bluetooth digital calipers, someone just needs to write an app for scale conversions. Any programmers out there? There's a a very niche market out there just waiting to be exploited.

 

Cheers,

 

Todd

[cteno4]

Todd,

 

yep you push a button on the caliper and it sends a text value of the current reading via Bluetooth. I could easily do a program and even an app, but very low on my priority list. Would be grand if you could just program in a scaling factor on the caliper itself, but that’s dreaming!

 

really using the 2mm trick works so well for me it’s not worth any effort! I kind of like doing the math in my head.

 

jeff

[cteno4]

One trick I used like a decade ago on a modeling project I had to cut out a bunch of scale pieces to different sizes is I just printed out a bunch of scale rules out at 1/150 and marked a measurement needed a lot on each and then clearly labeled it on the ruler and what it was for. Easy to grab and not have to find the measurements. Simple and quick templates sort of.

 

printed are also useful to measure on the layout where you can see all that well just plop a paper rule down and then mark the measurement on it and pull it off to read.

 

printed are also handy if you need a measurement on a curve.

 

down side of paper rules is they don’t last long, but easy to print out more. Also a bit hard to pick up off surfaces, but printing on cardstock helps that some.

 

cheers

 

jeff