Exercise 8
Estimating
(You'll be pleased to know that this is the last exercise. Will you qualify to become an inspector?)
When you are an inspector, there will be many occasions when you will
need to measure things. In this exercise we will find out if you are any good at using the
quick method of estimating lengths and heights.
Look at the building in the picture. Measuring the height would not be easy without a
ladder and a long tape measure. Even then, it wouldn't be easy for one person, especially
if the wind kept blowing your tape away.
The walls of the building are made of boards. If you measure the height of one board and
multiply it by the number of boards, you will know how high the building is. Well, almost.
There is a canopy at the front which makes the building a bit taller, but we won't bother
about that.
The back wall of the building has 12 boards. Each board is 17.5cm high.