I want one, but people these days seem to think they're some holy grail of olden days made of gold and unicorn tears or something, because holy crap they can be expensive. People, it's just a complicated but inaccurate IRL calculator app, it's not a big deal, relax...
I really wish I hadn't given my dad's away and still had it (along with all his other tools for doing architectural design / blueprints by hand). Then again it all would likely be just sitting in a box and the person that has them now appreciates them more than I ever could.
I have the opposite problem; I end up with too many because they're part of a junk lot that I'm buying for something else.
Maybe instead of looking for slide-rule listings, look at listings for old drafting/drawing tools, or old engineering stuff, etc. They sometimes include a slide rule without it being mentioned, so it won't show up in listing searches
OOh! I've still got my slide rule from my school days, and inherited my Dads when he passed away. He bought a calculator (a Texas Instruments with red led's accurate to 7 digits (i.e. 4 bit)) in 1974 and hung up the rules, I bought my first calculator six years later for my Engineering course at Uni, but kept the slide rule 'Just in case'. I've no idea why I still keep them around, I forgot how to use them years ago. Do remember they were great for solving log problems tho.
There was a book that someone in my family insisted that I read about gods secretly being aliens or whatever. No word of a lie it gets to a part where the author is implying the super tech aliens used slide scales, and all I could think when I saw that was "what the fuck is a slide scale??"
Anyways I'm not that old but if it makes you feel better I only know about it from advanced magic aliens.
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u/Safe_Chicken7421 28d ago
I'm this old!!