3 ms·

Planimeter

• acomjean 12y ago
  I used one as a civil engineer to estimate quantities of cut and fill from plans. They are quite amazing tools.
• dTal 12y ago
  It is not intuitive to me why this works, which is very exciting because it'll be fun when I "get it". Is there somewhere online that explains it in an intuitive way?
  • gballan 12y ago
    I don't get it either. Tell you what -- I'll put something together and post to HN. (Will take a couple of weeks or so.)
    • theoh 12y ago
      It's similar in principle to the algorithm described here: http://www.mathsisfun.com/geometry/area-irregular-polygons.html http://www.mathsisfun.com/geometry/area-irregular-polygons.h... Prytz (hatchet) planimeters are more tricky and approximate in the way they work.