military coordinate scale and protractor sale

#Military coordinate scale and protractor sale how to#

You should have learned about sections in your high school geography class, if you were awake.

A section is 640 acres and is 1 mile by 1 mile, so 4 contiguous red squares are probably a section. Red gridlines are land survey markings, usually (but not always) a quarter section. Keep in mind that if your map has the gridlines, these are the black grids, NOT the red gridlines. Most USGS Topo 7.5 minute maps printed in the past 30 years have UTM grids that are exactly 1 kilometer wide and tall, which exactly matches the 1:24,000 scale - how convenient! Older maps don’t have the grids, but many have tick marks in the margins. This would be useful for directing artillery fire or communicating to someone an exact point. If you understand and use UTM coordinates, which is beyond the scope of this post, you can use your map protractor to determine an exact point on the map.

100 meters = 109.36 yards (nine yards longer than a football field).

10 meters = 10.93 yards (which would be a first down in football).

If you are, then this conversion might help 🙂 No math needed unless you are metric Luddite. Using the 1:24,000 scale, you can see the total length of the scale is 1 kilometer, major tick marks are 100 meters, and minor tick marks are 10 meters. My map protractor has 4 scales in the center: If we divide 24,000 by 12 (12 inches in a foot), we would get 2,000 feet - meaning 1″ on the map equals 2,000′ feet on the ground.īut since you have a map protractor, it can measure for you. Of course inches isn’t a good “on the ground” measurement. If you had a ruler, you could measure the kilometer or the miles scale and then measure the distance on the map and calculate. So 1″ on the map is equal to 24,000″ on the ground. is equal to 24,000 of the same measurement on the ground. What this means is a measurement on the map, be it inches, feet, millimeters, etc. The most common map, the 7.5 minute map has a scale of 1:24,000. Measuring DistancesĮvery USGS Topographical Map has a scale printed at the bottom of the map. For more information on compensating for declination read Part 1 and Part 2. In the picture above, the string shows our bearing as 55˚. The string will pass under the bearing reading. Align the map protractor along a north/south gridline, while stringing you line on top of points A and B. Tie a knot in one end of the string, and thread the other end through the center hole in the map protractor. No problemo! All you need is a piece of string, thin tent guyline, thread, or even dental floss. No Pencil or Straight Edge?īut what if you don’t have a straight edge and/or a writing instrument to draw a line?

Then the map protractor is used to determine your bearing. If you recall, the first step is to draw a line between two points, A and B, A being your starting point and B your destination.

#Military coordinate scale and protractor sale how to#

In the post Set Up Your Compass Faster & More Accurately With A Map ProtractorI showed the readers how to navigate quicker and more accurately with a map and any compass using a map protractor.