This made me go hmmmm

[durango dude]

This photo is making rounds in sewing circles (the mrs). One of the comments was that tapes can stretch over time. I'm certain that's not the problem here. Also certain that my general impression of origin vs quality needs to be examined.

[leehljp]

The white one is what clothes makers used for my first 50 years and the yellow one is what they use now! I have a couple of XXL shirts that are smaller than some of my L shirts. I also have a pair of 38 Levi jeans with smaller waist than some of my Levi 36's.

[durango dude]

I'd love to believe you're correct! I've gone from 38 to 42 over last 4 years.

[cwsmith]

SOOOO, that's MY problem! When I was in my early 20's I used to wear 29 waist 32 length trousers and now I wear 34 w 30 l.... guess I shouldn't feel too distorted.

Measuring tapes do seem to vary and for that reason you should try to use the same one throughout your project. I have a HF long aluminum ruler that is okay up to about the first 24 or so inches, and then spreads after that. My Stanley 'LeverLocks" all seem to be the same, thankfully.

CWS

[LCHIEN]

maybe they're metric inches. :Q

[Jim Frye]

I recall years ago, my Brothers-In-Law and I were building a garage for one of them and when we started, someone said we should all get our tape measures out and compare them. Two of the four tapes were different than the other two. Not much, but off by 1/16" in 12". The discrepancy wasn't by brand either. The cutter's tape was deemed the "standard" and everyone else altered their measurements accordingly.

[os1kne]

Appears that the yellow tape is junk. Assuming the background grid is correct / accurate, the white tape is pretty close. I suppose shrinkage of the tape material is possible

The yellow tape was made in Taiwan, the white tape was made in China - different interpretation of inches?

[Carlos]

I've found very little variation over various tapes and rulers, but have found one or two that were clearly bogus. I check each new tape against a known good (Incra/Woodpecker) rule. I have tapes all over the shop, since it's convenient, but have one rule that is used to finalize all measurements. Most of my cuts are during processing and prep, where perfection isn't needed. Then on final sizing I use one great carpenter's tape for the whole thing, and/or the Incra/Woodpecker rules. All of those agree with each other.

[Carlos]

Also, I think it explains the difference between Taiwan and China on this chart: https://www.worlddata.info/average-penissize.php

[leehljp]

I wrote about the sizing of pants and shirts above but shoes do the same. At age 39, I went to Japan (for work, 25 years) and at the time I wore 10 shoes (American sizes) (Floreshims, Rockports, Reboks, Clarks, Bush etc). With in 10 years I was wearing 10.5's. About 6 or 7 years ago, I had to move up to 11s, and wides at that.

Is that common or is it a difference in sizing?

[LCHIEN]

I wrote about the sizing of pants and shirts above but shoes do the same. At age 39, I went to Japan (for work, 25 years) and at the time I wore 10 shoes (American sizes) (Floreshims, Rockports, Reboks, Clarks, Bush etc). With in 10 years I was wearing 10.5's. About 6 or 7 years ago, I had to move up to 11s, and wides at that.

Is that common or is it a difference in sizing?

When I was a young adult I recall my shoe size was a 7W or so.
I think my feet have been spreading... nowadays I wear a 9EEE or sometimes 9.5EEE

[Carlos]

As a young adult I was a 9.5W, and at some point around my 30s I had to go up half a size. Vanity sizing for shoes?? LOL

The wife is very small, and she has had to go from size 4-6 jeans 20-some years ago to where 00 is sometimes big on her now. Women's sizes have certainly changed.

[Morganish88]

Sometimes as we gain weight.....Typically it happens as ligaments relax. More comments in women after pregnancy as hormones responsible for relaxing stomach ligaments for expansion then relax all ligaments in body. But honestly, feet bear all of our weight and they are not without age and gravity ...

[durango dude]

Brooklyn park! I lived there when Jessie was mayor.

73rd way. Nice place!

[atgcpaul]

Clothes sizing around the world is a big pet peeve for me. I can wear an XL T-shirt but am just more comfortable in XXL. Whenever we travel or my parents travel, I like to have a souvenir T-shirt--something unique you can't find in the US.

I just asked them to just stop buying me shirts because it will never fit even though they buy the largest possible size. We were visiting Petra earlier this year and I found a T-shirt marked XXL. When I tried it on, it couldn't have been bigger than a medium. I gave the shirt to my Mom.

So the pet peeve part is that these shirts are clearly for tourists. No self respecting Jordanian is going to walk around with a Petra T-shirt with camels on it. Same goes for basically everywhere else in the world including Europe. Establish some global standard for clothing and go with it. I'd say the US is probably the best about accurately representing clothes sizes.

It also irks me when shoe companies redesign their shoe year to year but then also change the fit. I wear 11.5D shoes which works for most brands except Merrell where I was wearing an 11D until they changed something and added a "2" onto the back of the model name. Now I wear an 11.5D but the old 11D's fit feels the same. Problem was I had asked my Mom to buy and ship me the 11D which was now too tight.