Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
(OP)
I've been noticing a lot of engineers using lower case lettering for their calculation sheets. I never saw this before when working for pivate engineering firms, but now that i work for the government it seems rather common with gov employees. Is this common? Any comments? I personally don't like the look of it, but that is not to say the calculations are in any way inferior.





RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
If you pay taxes, you work for the government!
Mike McCann
MMC Engineering
http://mmcengineering.tripod.com
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
Mike McCann
MMC Engineering
http://mmcengineering.tripod.com
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
I have two problems with all upper case lettering: it's harder to read and it can be ambiguous once in a while. I would also prefer to use lower case lettering on drawings, but most people prefer all upper case lettering. I think this goes back to hand lettering and LEROY lettering, where using only half the available characters materially improved efficiency. I think the gain now is getting close to zero.
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"Is it the only lesson of history that mankind is unteachable?"
--Winston S. Churchill
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
PLF load always "w"
inches = "in"
Feet = "ft"
Foot-lbs = "ft-lbs"
Etc, etc.
Just depends on what you learned or grew up with!!
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
All drawings our company ever did was in upper case; my dad taught mechanical drafting and it was always upper case, too.
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
In hydrology, big Q and little q mean different, related things. (runoff in inches, flow rate in cfs) I've never in my life seen someone use a big N for Manning's roughness, I've never seen a lowercase P for rainfall, and I've seen both big and little Ts for time of concentration.
In my opinion, engineering is too complicated a game to go switching things back and forth just because your caps lock is on. Find out what the industry standard is and use that.
Hydrology, Drainage Analysis, Flood Studies, and Complex Stormwater Litigation for Atlanta and the South East - http://www.campbellcivil.com
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
Cliff
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
M moment
Mf factored moment
q Klf
Q total q
P point load, and Pf...
" inches
' feet
'K foot kips
'lb foot pounds
usually... and anything a word or so longer in written script... and I waste lots of paper...
Dik
RE: Upper Case Lettering on Calculations
out of our clothes, our budgets, and our houses... to name a few things.
Mike McCann
MMC Engineering
http://mmcengineering.tripod.com