TIL my $12 plastic speed square reads truer than the $45 aluminum one I carried for 8 years
Grabbed the cheap Swanson at a Fresno hardware store on a Saturday because I left my good one on a job in Clovis. Checked both against my framing square on the bench and the aluminum one was off by about a 16th over 12 inches. The plastic one was dead on. No idea how long the aluminum was lying to me on stair strings. Anybody else find cheap squares holding up better than the fancy ones?
Ha, so the expensive one was just fancy-looking and crooked, that's a classic. Nothing like finding out your trusty tool has been quietly lying to you for almost a decade, and on stair strings no less. Those stairs you built probably have a slight lean and you never even knew it. I bet the cheap plastic one is sitting there feeling pretty smug right now. At least you found out on a bench and not halfway through a set of stairs you already nailed in.