Name the Tool Used to Draw Circles

Drawing and illustrating in the pre-digital time

Some of the tools described hither are still in apply – at least in education at school. Withal, virtually of the items have disappeared from a professional environment. Even the cartoon board has disappeared. But nosotros all are still dreaming of screens of that size!

About french words courtesy by Daniel Blériot. [2001-12-15]

See also links and my individual drove.

drawing tool, blueprint tool	das zeichenwerkzeug	util à dessiner
Compass    beam compass bow compass drop compass divider compass	der zirkel der stangenzirkel der nullenzirkel der fallnullenzirkel der teilzirkel, stechzirkel	le compas la boîte à compas le compas à verge le compas à pompe le balustre
Photographic camera lucida	die camera lucida	le camera lucida, la chambre claire
Drawing board	das zeichenbrett die zeichenmaschine	la planche à dessin la auto à dessiner
Drawing instruments	das reisszeug
Drawing pen	die reißfeder die nachlauffeder die doppel-reißfeder	le tire-ligne le tire-ligne pour courbes le tire-ligne pour double trait
Ellipse compass	der ellipsenzirkel	???
French curve    Flat spline    Lesbian dominion	das kurvenlineal die straklatte	le pistolet (à dessin) ??? biegbares kurvenlineal
Pantograph	der pantograph, der storchenschnabel	le pantographe
Proportional compass	der reduktionszirkel (proportionalzirkel)	le compas de réduction
Protractor	der winkelmesser	le rapporteur
Ruler    Parallel ruler	das lineal das parallel-lineal	la règle (de proportions) la règle parallèle
Calibration	der maßstab	l'échelle [fem.]
Slide dominion    Calculation disk	der rechenschieber die rechenscheibe	la règle à calcul le disc à calcul
Set square	das zeichendreieck	l' équerre [fem.]
Template Lettering stencil	die schablone die schriftschablone	??? la trace-lettre
T-square	dice reißschiene	la règle à dessin
Circle drawing tool	der kreiszeichner	???
X2	der fluchtpunkt-zeichner	???

My private drove

Click on image for larger picture

Drawing pen

Early cartoon pens were fabricated similar to forceps, with a screw to adjust the distance of the ii legs which held the indian ink. I recall the time when the two legs fifty-fifty had to be smoothed with a honing stone to undo the waering from the very harsh paper. For my map drawing I also had a double pen (for streets) and a free wheeling pen for altitude curves (isohypses).

The pen at this drawing fountain pen could easily be exchanged for writing with types for narrow and wide lines.

This was my set of pens for a number of years...

Drawing lath

The most mutual drawing board for engineers and also for illustrators used a parallelograms to go on the rulers parallel to itself. The detail picture shows the 'head' of the machine: The rulers could be exchanged co-ordinate to the desired scale; they could also be rotated in fifteen degree steps or fixed at an arbitrary angle.

For broad drawing boards (peculiarly used in the send industy) the parallelogram mechanism was replaced by a horizontal rail on height with a 't-square' on roller barings property the drawing head.

Prepare square and T-square

Amateurs and students most fourth dimension are confined to simple forms of a drawing board with a t-square to depict horizontal lines (the board was not foursquare enough to allow for verticals also). Angles in steps of fifteen degrees require 2 fix squares with 90-45-45 degrees and 90-lx-xxx degrees. Arbitrary angles are supported by adjustable set squares.

For the desktop A2 and A3 sized drawing tablets became bachelor with a combination of t-square and protractor. I still have an A3 sized in utilize.

Ruler

For working on the desk-bound a ruler is still a handy tool. Most fourth dimension it is combined with a 1:i scale with tic marks at every mm. For typographic purpose also rulers with pica, points etc. are nevertheless in use.

Convenient tools on the desk are parallel moving rulers. Ane blazon has (condom coated) rollers to guide the movement. Some other type connects two parallel half-rulers with two legs forming a parallelogram with the ruler.The blazon with the rollers oft is combined with a machinery to slip the ruler pace be footstep for hatsching.

A more elaborate example is pictured hereafter. This is a multipurpose tool particularly for students. Even math formulas and trigonometric tables are available. With the various holes on the long edge a compass can exist simulated.

Scale

Since various drawing scales were needed, the tool combined 6 scales, for example, i:200, 1:50 etc. (metric engineer'due south scale) or ane:48, 1:128 etc. (regal). Also very foreign scales for rural maps could be found: 1:1440 and 1:2880 (builder'south scale).

Template

Not only children similar templates. Making illustrations on paper very ofttimes is faster than any computer based method... A standard catalogue for templates every bit of 1997 lists hexagons, ellipses, electric and chemic signs etc. For special purpose lettering stencils are even so used.

For drawings such every bit the following I created templates of my own using a 0.5mm plastic foil:

French curves

A mutual set of curves is the Burmester gear up displayed here. The first item is very handy for ellipses, the second very often fitts large parts of hyperbolas and the third (largest) particular is used about for parabolas.

During my time as a mechanical engineer I as well used a very special courving tool: some sort of plastic snake with lead spine, virtually twoscore cm long. This could be aptitude to the desired shape.

Flat spline

In ship building where drawings frequently were to the scale (or at to the lowest degree as large as rooms), another form of curving tools were in use. This is a long directly slat of forest or other bendable cloth. It was pinned down along few points shaping the curve.

Flexible curve

To accommodate to arbitrary curved shapes a flexible rule (plastic with pb spine) is used. This has no inner tension, then command points did not work properly. Sometimes it was called lesbian rule.

Compasses

Various types of compasses and cartoon pens were combined in a box of drawing instruments. The compass in this set could draw circles upwardly to 25 cm in bore by ways of an elongation rod. To draw very small circles a drop compass and a bowcompass is included, sometimes also a divider compass with ii pins.

The left picture is the ready from my father (most 1930), the right is from the catalogue of Linex, DK (2015).

Beam compass

For larger circles the needle and pencil are bundled on sliders on a rod or axle, which might as well be eleongated. I remember that one time we needed a radius of 4m. Kneeling on the floor we simply used an ordinary wooden rod of that length. In that location are however as well special instruments to describe large circles.

Proportional compasses

Proportional compasses are used to divide distances or to 'convert' them according to a scale. A specialized device for the relation of the golden rectangle may be still in use past sculpturers and other artists. The rightmost image depicts an instrument to dissever a altitude into upwards to 10 equal parts.

Cartoon big circles

Just how to describe circles, if the center tin not be reached? I have only a scetch of such an instrument. There were other types available with greater accuracy, but more elaborate.

b = r - sqrt(r² - aⁱⁱ) For a given radius angle alpha is constant. Considering a is an instrument constant, there were tables to get b from the desired radius. A unproblematic form of this instrument consists only of two streight strips of forest fixed together in the position 1 and sliding at pins A and B on the board.

H. Seyfert patented 1880 an instrument which uses a steel-bract (c-c). It is supported at both ends (m). The arc is created by pushing the steel bract at the position chiliad, while pulling the supports at thousand. The angle of the steel-blade is perfomed by moving the pin east down. The various levers swing effectually the index pins x. This is done by turning a disk which has a spiral notch engagend with the pivot e. This disk is marked with the radius of the created arc. The graduation starts with 5000 mm and goes (for one turn) to 300 mm. With a second plough a radius of 150 mm can be reached.

Ellipse compasses

Before yous just could drag your mouse to get an ellipsis of whatsoever size both templates and special mechanical devices were used. The two devices depicted use different methods of cartoon an ellipse.

The method using a thread is at least still used by gardeners. Using a abrupt pencil, sparse pins and a sparse thread you tin can go quite a good precision by this method first described at least by Descartes (1596 - 1650):

Based on the desired long and short axes you lot can construct the positions of the focal points where the pins are inserted f = sqrt (a2 - b2) The length of the thread is 2(a+ f)

Pantograph

For enlarging and reducing drawings this tool was at least in utilise by amateurs. Heavy duty models are withal in use for engraving and contour milling.

Another form of this tool was called Storchenschnabel in German.

Perspective illustrations

To draw correctly with perspective using vanishing points broad cartoon boards with special rods were used. Allow'southward see, maybe I find a photo from such a device.

Skilled users could combine photographs with drawn illustrations - a task nearly everybody tin can perform now with graphic software.

Camera lucida

You might know the camera obscura, which works just for very luminous situations. Photographic camera lucida (light sleeping accommodation) was developed past W. H. Wollaston in 1807 to draw landscapes etc. with ease. Meet also near.com. The main component is a iv-sided glass prism. From the oject G the lite is seen by the eye A in Z, where the pencil tin can be used to depict the object. When the instrument is congenital with mirrors rather than a prism it is chosen mirror lucida. The following is a 'folded away' instrument from the 18th century in the catalogue of gemmary.com. Modern versions of a camera lucida can be purchased (for case) from: photographic camera-obsura-lucida.shop.com (with videos explaning the use) or cameralucida.org.uk, and here a model for less than USD 80.- Some microscope manufacturers also provide "camera lucida mirrors" or "camera lucida prisms" for drawing (rather than photographing) the seen epitome. For example, Cosmo Laboratory Equipment, Kay Kay Global Suppliers or Kshitij Innovation.

Protractor

Various forms are all the same in employ at school. The almost used one provides 180°. I still have one with 400^g for the full circle (and I also accept trigonometric tables for these 'neugrad' or 'new gradation' which allows more easy mathematical handling of arcs). Still bachelor are protractors with 400^k (gon) to the full circle. The divison of a right angle into 100 gon, ... immune more piece of cake calculations in trigonometric tables (decimal arrangement).

For armed forces use 'arms' versions with 6400 units for the full circle were available (at least in Switzerland).

Slide rule

This is non a drawing tool per se, but was used by educated people for calculations. The analogue calculator is based on the logarithms, discovered (or developed) by Leibnitz, Newton and Napir ⁱ⁾. This principle reduces multiplication and partitioning to addition and substraction. Potenzation and roots are reduced to multiplication and division. But also special scales for trigonometric calculations etc. were in use. The typical slide rule of an engineer had 25 scales and was 25cm long. this allowed an accuracy of 3 - 4 digits.

The sliding window shows the square of iv (calibration D) to be xvi (scale A). The tong shows the multiplication of i.26 by 3.17 (C) = iv (D).

'Winding up' the scales on circles allows a high precision even with a small device. Specialised versions of calculation disks are notwithstanding in apply, for example, to calculate settings of machines.

Sources

Bachmann-Forberg: Technisches Zeichnen; B.G. Teubner; Leipzig 19954

A. Gruber: Zeichen- Mal- und Messgeräte, Otto Maier; Ravensburg ca 1940

Denis Diderot: Encyclopédie, ou Dictionnaire des sciences, des arts et des métiers; Paris, 1762 - 1777 (I accept simply a facsimile of the image tables).

Katalog 894 (Baronial 1994) Racher & Co AG, Zürich.

Meyer zur Capellen, Walter, Mathematische Instrumente. Leipzig: Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft Geest & Portig M.-Grand, 1947.

Links

Lueger

Lueger: Lexikon der gesamten Technik (1904)

Wikipedia

Category:Technical drawing
Kategorie:Zeichenwerkzeug

Camera Lucida, Obscura etc.

Origin of Shadows past Ross Woodrow, Academy of Newcastle, Australia.

Compass, Protractor

Wolfram Research
Spezialisierung und Generalisierung in der Entwicklung der Zirkel (wenn nicht mehr dort: hier).

Cartoon tools

Ecobra GmbH, Due north�rnberg, Germany
Tecnomarket (Italy): Disegno tecnico

Slide rules

Seite der deutschsprachigen Rechenschieber-Sammler

Notes

one) Of course, the Swiss claim Jost Bürgi to be the discoverer / programmer of logarithms...

funkcriongul.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.daube.ch/docu/glossary/drawingtools.html

Share this post