Standard Way to Give Dimensions

OK,LOL

-- Thos. Angle

It would be great if everyone could agree on a format for dims, but I don’t know if it’s going to happen. What if we all agreed to label our dims with a descriptive letter? w=width, l=length, h=height, d=depth, t=thickness. I find that these are really helpful to me when I forget what order I took measurements.

-- http://www.north40custom.com -- http://north40studios.etsy.com --

I agree with Peter. Remember the correct order is difficult. I’m still having trouble with the order of my kids.

-- When you give someone a chance it may well be their last.

So would a 2×4 be a 4×2 if used on edge?

Thanks for the lesson as I’ve wondered what was proper. Being an untrained newbie, I always use the (T), (W), (L) with measurements just to make things more precise and understood since my memory has a deficit. I’ll try to keep that one in my head.

-- "They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night." ~ Edgar Allan Poe

Rikkor, i would say in solid wood the smallest side would always be considered the thickness and noted first. As in 4 3/4” thick x 5” wide. The real problem of all this isn’t really noticable until you get to sheet goods with a grain direction.

Take the example of an adjustable shelf going in a cabinet where its deeper than it is long and you want to apply a nosing to the front edge. A 12” x 25” shelf is not the same thing as a 25” x 12” shelf, and it gives you a false indication of which edge is to be nosed regarldless of the graining problem.

-- miles125, Alabama.."Architecture is frozen music""

I’d agree with the letter. I personally don’t care what order they are in just put a letter indicating what each stands for and everyone can figure it out.

It seems like the standard is to have no standard. Any real woodworker I know experesses their measurement in the same way you do. But that’s the “real” problem. In my small area I can count on both hands the number of real woodworkers. The rest are “wanna bees”, “neverwas” or my favorite “doneven tries”. Working in a commercial cabinet shop is like spending your days in a game of twenty question with people who know what they want but have no idea the proper way to ask for it. Even guys who work in the shop can be like little baby balling for their bottle because they don’t know how to say I’m hungry.

-- Rogue

how deep is the water ? how deep are your counter tops / cabinets ? How wide is your sideboard ? how long is your kitchen table ? There must be a book out there somewhere that lists all of the standard terms that we use and from what angle things are viewed from . L O L…this is a great subject , Miles ! : )

-- You know you're getting old when you know the difference between you're (you are) and your (belonging to you) AND how to use them in a sentence .

Good luck Miles. But I don’t like your chances. LOL

-- Grumpy - "Always look on the bright side of life"- Monty Python

When I worked construction Miles, I was working with a newbie and he was shouting measurements to me. One and only once, he called out” 4 and four little marks”. I said are they the real little marks or the inbetween marks, he looked real hard and said, no, the’re the real little marks. I went to the boss and told him to get rid of the guy, or at least move him he was no help to me. It could have been 4 1/8 or 4 1/2 . I told him what happened, the boss asked me if he could shovel, I said that is something he might be able to do.

-- Mike. mwurm13@yahoo.com

I guess I’m back to being the shop-sweep. I measure by the “little marks” method, unless of course I have the measuring tape that labels the little marks :0

I agree with the confusion – with measuring and with dates (I’d love it if people stopped doing the /08/12/08 method for the dates , let’s just call it like it is! Dec. 8, 2008 or Aug. 12, 2008.) and for measuring remembering that you may not be talking to a professional, the L W H T letters are really helpful (even though I have to admit I would have been scratching my head at the “T” part) :)

Good discussion

-- ~ Debbie, Canada (http://www.execulink.com/~yohan)

I was in the packaging business for twenty years and it was always length, width, and depth!

-- spanky46 -- Never enough clamps...Never enough tools...Never enough time.