Become an Expert at Using a Pipe Diameter Tape Measure in 5 Minutes!

If you need to find the diameter of a pipe or a pipeline, here’s a 5 minute crash course..

1. Buy a pipe diameter tape measure.
2. Notice that one side is probably just a regular inch tape measure.
3. The other side is also in inches, but it seems to be stretched out about 3 times longer than normal. It’s actually stretched out by a factor of pi (3.14159). This is the diameter tape side.
4. Use the diameter tape side for this lesson.
5. Clean off the pipe of any dirt or other debris.
6. Simply wrap the tape around the pipe, keeping the diameter side out, so you can read it.
7. Note where the zero mark lines up on the tape. That gives you the outside diameter of the pipe.
8. It may be hard to read the markings. They are probably not marked the same as a regular tape. They may be in 64ths of an inch or 100ths of an inch. Either way, you have just learned how to use a diameter tape!