Took me 6 years to realize I was using the wrong side of my scale

I was in the middle of marking out a cabinet door last Tuesday and kept getting weird measurements. My buddy Dan walked over, looked at my tape, and goes 'dude your hook is on the wrong side of the scribe mark.' I had been subtracting a 16th every time I measured because I was always putting the tape hook past the mark instead of on it. Felt like an idiot but at least now my dado cuts actually line up. Anyone else have a basic measuring habit they had to unlearn?

2 comments

2 Comments

shanel131mo ago

Funny you mention that @lily360, because I actually do a similar thing on my speed square. I flip it upside down and read the hip/valley scale from the wrong edge, just got used to it framing roofs. But for tapes, I had to unlearn the habit of hooking over the edge of the board when I was measuring inside corner to inside corner. Kept getting short cuts because I was counting the hook thickness twice. The real trick I figured out is marking your start point with a tiny dot instead of a line, makes the hook placement way more obvious no matter which side you use.

lily3601mo ago

Huh, I actually do that on purpose. I'm left handed so I flip the hook around and read from the other side of the scribe mark all the time. It sounds weird but I got used to it back when I built kitchen cabinets because I could mark and cut faster without flipping the tape over. I guess both sides work fine once your brain adjusts to the offset, just have to pick one and stick with it.