My confession – I am a baseball fan. In baseball, the tale of the tape is usually in regards to how far a home run has been hit.

Ever been to the Mall of America? The mall is built atop of the location of the old Metropolitan Stadium (one time home of the Minnesota Twins).

On June 3, 1967, Harmon Killebrew hit a 520-foot home run. This is commemorated at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, which includes a plaque marking home plate, and one red-painted seat from the Met which was placed at the location and elevation of the landing spot of the home run.

Today’s tale of the tape is not near as dramatic. It involves the ultimate combination, a builder and a tape measure. Add in “dog ears” just to make it interesting.

Hansen Pole Buildings Designer Rachel made the following report.

“Paul B’s builder is on the phone. He says he is doing dog ears and the steel is one inch too short. He says the concrete is only 3-1/2”. It is the trim which is short. He has 18-3/4” of trim and has to cover 19-3/4”, so is wondering if he should eliminate the dog ears.”

As the interchange developed, my first thought was the builder was talking about the steel siding above the overhead door opening. Since we have never had a client with this as a problem and the steel lengths calculated appeared to be correct, I was baffled until Rachel said it was a “problem with the trim”.

Hansen Buildings provides materials, for any residential overhead door, to be able to create 45 degree dog ears at the top of the openings. It is a nice aesthetic feature, which many clients appreciate.

The concrete thickness had absolutely nothing to do with the issue at hand, so you can discard this as a clue.

In the installation instructions for dog ears, they are to be placed with the edges at 12 inches down and 12 inches across from the corner. Using my math skills from junior high school, I can square both of these number, add them together and take the square root of the sum and end up with 16.97” (call it 17”). The Hansen Buildings Construction Guide instructions detail how to create these 17 inch long pieces.

The ah ha moment…..builder is trying to cover 19-3/4” which should have been 17” in length!

Hmmmm.