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TradIsGood
Trad climber
Gunks end of country
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Topic Author's Original Post - Mar 3, 2006 - 12:14pm PT
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For shorter buildings, one can time the fall of the cat.
The height is then calculated from the formula:
 height = 4.9 meters * t^2,
where t is measured in seconds.
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climberweenie
Trad climber
San Jose, CA
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one could also use a long measuring tape from the top, using the cat as ballast to get the tape down to the ground. Don't forget to add the height of the cat.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Well, you calculations maybe off if the cat died of bird flu. How long is cat's gut? Maybe measure height in guts...
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TradIsGood
Trad climber
Gunks end of country
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 3, 2006 - 12:34pm PT
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Good Janet. That is why the first answer only works for relatively short buildings (or in low wind conditions). For taller buildings it may be useful to attach the cat to a weight lifting plate or a bowling ball.
Of course, it really does not matter what sound it makes hitting the ground using this particular technique.
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Crimpergirl
Sport climber
St. Louis
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If the cat has been run over by a car, you could assume that the cat measures, from tip of tail, to head approximately 31". Stacking them tip to tip, (and this is easy given their stiffness) you could estimate of the height of any building.
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TradIsGood
Trad climber
Gunks end of country
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 3, 2006 - 12:39pm PT
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Crimper - that is good, or just measure the building in units of flat cats.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Hold the cat by the end of the tail at sufficient distance from the building where the body of the cat can be visually superimposed over the full height of the building. Measure distance from building to cat, measure cat, measure length of arm, calculate angle from eyes to cat nose and tail, and extrapolate height of building...
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Crimpergirl
Sport climber
St. Louis
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After reading Healy's suggestion, I feel really inadequate. That is simply brilliant!
By the way, I wanted to mention that one can use cats to determine the volume of any room in a building. For example, on average a cat equals 1.2 sf, (we can refer to this unit of measure as a "cat"), then my office has a volume of exactly 1,820 cats.
Cool.
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TradIsGood
Trad climber
Gunks end of country
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 3, 2006 - 12:46pm PT
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healyje, you can do it simpler. Hint - You do not need to measure the angle. :-)
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TradIsGood
Trad climber
Gunks end of country
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 3, 2006 - 12:47pm PT
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Janet, surely you have an answer to that problem.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Trad, in math I am an drooling idiot...
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TradIsGood
Trad climber
Gunks end of country
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 3, 2006 - 12:56pm PT
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healyje, you can only get partial credit with that answer. But collaborating with colleagues is permissible. :)
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Crimpergirl
Sport climber
St. Louis
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Janet:
I concede that your method of measuring volume appears more efficient. I will continue toiling away to develop a better measurement strategy....
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ThomasKeefer
Trad climber
Monterey, CA
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You can put a mirror on the ground at a fixed distance from the building and then walk toward the mirror and the building until you see the top of the building. Once you you see the top, drop the dead cat on the ground as a marker. Measure your height (only to your eyes- this is why you need the cats- your normal height wont work) using any one of the 'dead cat' measuring tips above, the distance between the mirror and building and the distance between the dead cat and the mirror. You can then, using geometry (think SOCAHTOA) figure the agle your eyes make with the mirror. Using Snells law (incidence angle = refracted angle if there is a homogenous medium) you can very accurately determine the height of the building. The only down side to this is that it could require two dead cats-one to mark and one to measure.. . but it would be the most accurate in that it relies only on pure science without requirements for simplifactions to account for friction..
BTW.. you would want to Skin the Cat before any sort of drop tests or measurements since the fur would surely induce errors.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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I like that one...
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TradIsGood
Trad climber
Gunks end of country
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 3, 2006 - 02:28pm PT
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Nice TK, That works very nicely. Clearly you could probably finish healy's solution as well.
The volume problem is an interesting variation, that I have not yet had time to really think about.
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G_Gnome
Gym climber
The Big City
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If measuring volume, make sure to leave the skin on the tail, as skinned cat tail is awfully slippery.
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ThomasKeefer
Trad climber
Monterey, CA
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The volume is not an easy one.. I would say impossible... for a number of reasons.
First, there is "compaction of dead cats"(tm) wherby you have dissimilar contributions from what once were equi-volumous cats.
Second, you need to have equi-volumous cats to start off-width.
I would say that if you are into measuring room volumes... you should head to PB in san diego and round up about a hundred (scale +/- for a wag at the actual volume) of those plastic chicks that walk around. Hint.. tell them that there is a people magazine photo shoot at your place of interest. dunk one of these girls into a medium sized graduated cyllindar (hint- you will need extra ballast to offset the bouyance of fake tits for complete submersion). Measure off the volume change on the cyllinder. You know have the volume of the average chick. A good assumption based on my field research is that there is very little variance on their dimensions so just start stuffing them in the room...
count them as they go in (hint: do this yourself as you won't want a PB chick doing any counting)
Now have a ST party and celebrate with Wine, Beer and zima(for the dummies).
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TradIsGood
Trad climber
Gunks end of country
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 3, 2006 - 03:24pm PT
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Rajmit, that would only work like in healy's example if you were able to measure the angle. And unlike healy's example, you would need to account for a catenary shape sag. Try to figure out how to do it without the need for measuring the angle.
BTW. We are starting to run out of cats.
Perhaps we should be restricting ourselves to single cat solutions. :-)
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TradIsGood
Trad climber
Gunks end of country
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 3, 2006 - 03:27pm PT
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tofu, strictly whether he could use less than half depends on the angle. If he measured if from very close to the base, he would hardly save any cats at all.
Also folks, in the feline spirit, let's not leave out the details. Just don't say use geometry. Note that original solution to get you thinking did not just say use the well known formula for distances versus time for falling objects on earth.
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