How to Calculate Building Height
Although numerous complex and expensive devices exist to calculate the height of a building, you can accomplish this task without any of them. An accurate measurement can be obtained using some basic trigonometric skills, a measuring tape, a meter stick and the Sun.
What you will need:
- Meter stick or other long straight object
- Measuring tape
- The Sun
- Make sure that you are attempting your calculations when the Sun is high enough in the sky that it casts the building's shadow down to the ground.
- Place your meter stick in the ground so that the building's shadow is covering most of it. Do this by placing it exactly on the edge of the shadow and then by standing it up or inserting it into the ground a few inches closer to the building.
- Determine the distance up the meter stick where the building's shadow stops, and designate this measurement "A." Next, measure the distance between the bottom of the meter stick and the shadow's edge on the ground. Designate this measurement "B."
- Measure the distance between the shadow's edge on the ground and the base of the building, and designate it "C."
- Make sure that all your measurements are in the same units, whether it be feet or inches.
- Divide A by B, and then multiply that number by C. The resulting number is the height of the building in feet or inches, whichever unit of measurement that you used.