The art of measuring long distances without special tools tape measures is something that you can learn. It will definitely take some time to gauge a certain distance—say, 9 meters (29.5276 feet)—by eye. However, with practice, you, too, can master this life skill.
If you don’t have years to spend on learning this skill, you can do the next best thing: use the lengths of common objects as references. In this brief guide, I’ll share with you # common items that you can use as references for measuring 9 meters or close to it.
½ Step-Deck Trailer
A step-deck trailer is a type of trailer that truckers use when transporting large loads. The double-deck style of this trailer allows businesses to place tall objects—i.e., excavators—atop the deck without surpassing legal towing height restrictions. On average, a step-deck trailer, as well as most trailer types, measures between 48 and 53 feet long.
So, if you’ve seen a step-deck trailer before, you would have to imagine slicing it in half to get around 24 to 26.5 feet, which is pretty close to the 9-meter distance we want to measure.
1 Garden Hose + 1 Golf Club
Garden hoses come in a variety of sizes. They typically measure between 25 and 100 feet, though you can purchase hoses at 25-foot increments. A 25-foot hose is about the same as 8 meters.
So, how do we compensate for the missing 1 meter? Adding another 25 feet to get a 50-foot hose would be too long. However, if you have a golf club on hand, you could use that, as well as any other item measuring 1 meter long, to the end of a 25-foot garden hose to reach 9 meters.
4 Golf Carts
I know that golf carts aren’t the typical vehicle people have in their homes. However, if you have a golf club on hand, you’re probably aware of a golf cart’s dimensions. If you’re not, the standard 2-seater golf cart measures about 92 inches long, which is about 2.3 meters.
So, if we took 4 standard golf carts and placed them in a line lengthwise, they would give us a collective length of 9.2 meters—just 20 centimeters beyond the 9-meter mark.
1 Beach Volleyball Net
Beach volleyball is a pretty entertaining sport, even if you have no idea how to position your hands to hit a volleyball. According to Volleyball USA, the dimensions of a standard beach volleyball net should measure 32 feet long. That is about three-quarters of a meter longer than 9 meters.
Alternatively, you could take 3 of the 10.5-foot-long poles to get 30.5 feet or 9.37 feet, which is much closer to the 9-meter point.
1/10 Football Field
If you’re a fan of American Football, you’re probably well aware that the playing area of a football field is 100 yards (300 feet or 91.44 meters) long. Every 5 yards of a football playing field is denoted by a long white line that spans the width of the field.
1 yard is about the same as a meter (0.9144 meters, to be exact). So, if we took the 0 to 10-yard area of a football field, that would get you to 9.144 meters.
1 Extension Cord + 2 Newborn Babies
Extension cords can be as long or as short as you want. Some retail stores carry extension cords with cables that start at 25 feet long, which is identical to the length of a short garden hose. So, we would have to apply the same system to compensate for the missing meter.
Instead of using a golf club, if you have a pair of newborn twins, you can use their collective heights to add the missing meter onto the end of the extension cord. That would get you exactly or pretty close to 9 meters.
3 2 × 4 Boards
One of the most popular lumber sizes among woodworker DIY-ers is the 2 × 4. A 2 × 4 board supposedly measures 2 × 4 inches and 10 feet, but in reality, the measurements are actually closer to 1.5 × 3.5 inches by 10 feet long. But what we’re really interested in is the board’s length.
If you have 3 uncut, ready-to-use 2 × 4 boards in your garage workshop, placing them end to end in a straight line will give you about 30 feet. That’s a mere 6 inches past the 9-meter point.
9 Door Frame Widths
The easiest way to measure 9 meters without going under or over is by taking 9 1-meter-long objects and placing them end to end. In this guide, I’ve spoken about how a golf club, as well as two newborn babies, is about 1 meter long. But if you really want to make it easier for yourself, just use the width of a doorframe.
In general, doorframes measure 1 meter wide. So, try to imagine placing 9 doorframes side by side, and it should be pretty easy to envision what 9 meters looks like.
1 Squash Court
Squash is probably one of the most intense sports of all time, right behind Jai Lai. Squash is sort of like tennis, but the two opposing players are on the same side of a “half-court.” The purpose of the game is to get the ball to bounce twice on the ground before your opponent has a chance to smash it against the wall.
If you’ve been around a squash court before, you probably know that an official court measures 9.75 meters long, which is close to 9 meters. Alternatively, you can take the height from the floor to the lower edge of the front-wall line (4.57 meters) and multiply it by 2 to get 9.14 meters.
1.5 Diving Boards
There’s nothing more enjoyable than cannon-bombing into a pool on a hot summer day. However, the diving board has to be sturdy enough. The average diving board for a 7.5-meter platform is 6 meters. That means 1.5 of them would get you to the 9-meter mark.
Or you can use the diving board’s width (3 meters) and imagine placing three of them side by side to get you to precisely 9 meters.
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