3 Great Measuring Tips from “See Jane Drill”

Leah Bolden, the building contractor and educator who does the YouTube series See Jane Drill strikes again with a wonderful and brief measuring tips video. I love the way she reveals features on tools that many of us may not have heard about. When we did a post about her 4 Tape Measure Tricks video, we heard from so many people who had never heard of some of these features. And in this video, she even reveals another feature found on an average tape measure that you may have overlooked.

Scribe a Line on a Long Board

Leah reveals another feature found on the end hook of most commercial tape measures. Besides the nail/screw grab and the serrated marking edge (discussed in the previous post about her tape measure video), there is also a notch in the center of the serrated edge. She shows you how to use this notch to accept a pencil for scribing a line along a long workpiece.

Use a Framing Square to Mark a Perfect Cross Cut

If you’ve ever used a framing square to mark a perpendicular line across a board, you may have done it the first way Leah shows you, which is less than perfectly accurate. She then shows you the correct way to get a perfectly perpendicular mark (basically by dropping one edge of the square down along the edge of the workpiece).

How to Use Stair Gauges

You may have seen these little brass screw-down gauge thingies in a tool box before and wondered exactly what they are for. They are for accurately and repeatedly marking angles with a framing square. They are especially designed for accurately marking out the angles for the rise and tread on stair stringers. Here, Leah shows you exactly how to use this specialty tool.