Weird Measuring Device

[Alain.Mark]

Hey guys our professor asked us to invent a unique measuring device.....

ANY IDEAS? btw, the device must be unique... and practical ofc...

+rep for the best idea.... :3

 

[Elite Slayer]

Even though I deem it slightly awkward, I do appreciate you consulting Hive members on such an innovative endeavour.
However, it must be asked that you please be more specific. What are you trying to measure? There are hundreds of elements in this world that can be measured, and it's helpful to know what you're looking for.

 

[Alain.Mark]

some students just made a combination of protractors and rulers (mediocre in my opinion but they still got approved... dumb indeed)

Anyway, we need something PRACTICAL that can measure stuff...
ex:
a device can measure the wind's direction in degrees...

 

[WherewolfTherewolf]

If you want to go a mathmatics heavy route you could create a device that measures height via the time it takes a specefic mass to drop from it, think a hollow tube with a ball in it - the ball has a slider under it that you can slide up and down the tube, slide the ball to the correct height of the object and then slide it out underneath the ball.

Ideally when you remove the slide, it'd automatically start a timer but you can do this manually yourself. When the ball hits the bottom ideally it'd stop the timer, but this can be manually done too. Now using the data collected from the operation you're a few simple physics equations away from determining the height of the object.

As far as practicality goes, it's not all that practical for small things - but think large object where you'd have difficulty finding a ruler long enough to measure it, it could be a bit more accurate for these types of operations.

Even if it is a big unpractical mess, it could still garner you some attention for trying to approach the situation with some sort of physics based operation that's different from the obvious (IE a stick with lines for distance).

 

[The Reborn Devil]

Perhaps you could make a device which measures the effective temperature. Regular thermometers only measure the temperature of the air, but they don't take into account wind, which makes it feel colder. Basically you would need to measure the rate at which an object loses heat and convert that into a value humans can understand (i.e Celsius/Fahrenheit).

 

[HINDYhat]

Make something like a hair hygrometer, but using something else than a hair.

Basically, a hair attached to a block. The hair changes length with air humidity, so you can measure it by having a few reference points (I'm not sure if it's a linear relationship, so yeah).

 

[Alain.Mark]

Thanks guys!