Brent Black, the hat dealer mentioned in the article, has a problem that is itching for a solution:
> Manually counting the rows of weave is a tedious task.
> If there are any inventors out there, the ideal scanner would be about the size of the handheld scanners I’ve seen used at the checkout register in some stores. The scanner would have a one inch by one inch reading window that would be placed against the surface of the hat. The user would push a button or pull a “trigger” and the scanner would scan the rows of weave both horizontally and vertically. The LED readout would report that the hat is 23-27-621.
> Manually counting the rows of weave is a tedious task.
> If there are any inventors out there, the ideal scanner would be about the size of the handheld scanners I’ve seen used at the checkout register in some stores. The scanner would have a one inch by one inch reading window that would be placed against the surface of the hat. The user would push a button or pull a “trigger” and the scanner would scan the rows of weave both horizontally and vertically. The LED readout would report that the hat is 23-27-621.
> Call me when you have my scanner ready.
http://www.brentblack.com/pages/panamahatgrades2.html