Been using a speed square wrong for 10 years...

I was on a job framing a deck last week in Tulsa and a guy maybe 22 years old walks over and points out I was holding my speed square upside down for scribing lines the whole time. He showed me the right way in like 30 seconds and I felt like a total idiot. Has anyone else had one of those moments where you learn the simplest thing way later than you should?

3 comments

3 Comments

christopher674mo ago

That reminds me of the time I spent like five years using a framing square backwards for checking rafter angles. I kept getting these weird cuts and thought my saw was messed up. Turns out I was just reading the numbers wrong because I had the tongue and body flipped around in my head. A old timer at the lumber yard caught me doing it and laughed his ass off before setting me straight. It's one of those things where once you see it the right way you can't believe you ever did it wrong in the first place. But hey at least you found out now instead of going another ten years making the same mistake like I ALMOST did with my square.

aaron1971mo ago

Laughing pretty hard at this because I did the exact same thing with my speed square for like a year. Kept cutting birdsmouths that looked like a kindergartner drew them and blamed my circular saw blade. Probably walked past that tape trick a hundred times at the hardware store and thought it was for like, labeling your tools or something dumb. At least you got caught by an old timer instead of figuring it out when a roof collapsed or something.

sams254mo ago

My uncle taught me to mark the tongue with a piece of tape and write "short" on it. That way you always know which side is for the plumb cut and which is for the seat. It sounds dumb but after a long day you can totally space out and grab it wrong. That old timer probably saved you a mountain of wasted lumber.