How to Read an Architect's Ruler

An architect's ruler, also called an architect's scale or scale stick, allows you to easily interpret scale drawings. These drawings maintain the proportion of an object's actual size at a specific ratio. For example, a house blueprint might be drawn in 1/4-inch scale, which means that 1/4 inch in the drawing equal 1 foot in the real house. These drawings are as precise as possible to allow architects, engineers and construction workers to accurately build or remodel based on the plans. A standard three-sided scale stick offers 12 different scales to simplify conversion of a variety of drawing types, but flat versions are also available offering two to four different scales.

Scale drawing

Instructions

- 1
  Locate the scale on the drawing you are trying to interpret. It is usually in a box with other information about the drawing, and will look something like: 1/2" = 1'.
- 2
  Check the ends of your architect's ruler to find the scale that matches your drawing--in this example, 1/2. Lay the scale on the drawing so the scale size notation is facing upright against a line you want to measure.
- 3
  Align the "0" at the beginning of a line you want to measure. The markings to the side of the "0" closest to the end of the ruler denote inches, while the markings to the opposite side of the "0" indicate feet. Ignore any numbers that are upside-down. Triangular scales will have two scales on the same side; one reads right to left and the other left to right. These numbers are staggered so one set is higher and the other is lower. Use the set that aligns with the "0" nearest your scale size notation and ignore the other.
- 4
  Find the end of the line you want to measure and slide the scale away from the "0" end until the nearest number is at the end of the line. This is the number of feet the line represents. The "0" will no longer be aligned with the beginning of the line you are measuring (unless it is in even feet), so count the number of inch lines beyond the "0." If the end of the line you are measuring is at the "4" marker and the beginning is three marks before the "0" marker, the line represents an object that is 4 feet 3 inches long.

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