How to set scale of y axis for time

[Meenie]

I have Excel 2003 and am having trouble with the y axis scale for minutes.
the times I'm showing in my clustered column chart range from 30 seconds to
6 minutes and 34 seconds.
I copied a scale from another chart and had to fiddle with it a bit to get
it to show the right scale.
The scale I copied was:
Minumum: 0
Max: 0.166666
Major Unit: 0.02083333
Minor Unit: 0.00694444

I had to change it (by some major trial and error) to:
Min: 0
Max: 0.2866666
Major Unit: 0.0308333
Minor Unit: 0.00694444

Can you tell me how to figure this out so I can set it the way I want next
time?
thanks Meenie

 

[David Biddulph]

Simply type in the times in time format, such as 0:10:00 instead of
0.00694444
Excel will change the values to General format, but accepts inputs as times.
I think I heard that Excel 2007 would not accept time inputs in this way.

 

[Jon Peltier]

If you need the decimal equivalent of a time, recall that in Excel a date is
a whole number (number of days since 1-Jan-1900) and a time is a fraction of
a 24-hour day.

30 seconds =
30/60 minutes =
30/60/60 hours =
30/60/60/24 days = 30/86400 = 0.000347222 days

6 min 34 sec = 6 + 34/60 min =
(6 + 34/60)/60 hours =
(6 + 34/60)/60/24 days = (6 + 34/60)/1440 days = 0.004560185 days

Or you could enter the time in a cell in HH:MM:SS format (you need hours
even if they are zero) and change the format to General:

0:06:34 = 0.004560185 in General format.

- Jon
-------
Jon Peltier, Peltier Technical Services, Inc.
http://PeltierTech.com/WordPress/

Don't miss it! Only two weeks away!

Advanced Excel Conference - June 17-18 2009 - Charting and Programming
http://peltiertech.com/Training/2009-06-ACNJ/AdvExcelConf200906ACNJ.html
_______

 

[Meenie]

I tried that, but it would give me the 0 at the bottom of the axis and no
other numbers - no tick marks, nothing else.

 

[Meenie]

Oops I apologize David, it does work. In the numbers they'd put in the graph,
they were reporting minutes like hours and seconds like minutes. I was
comparing apples to oranges...
and otherwise I wasn't entering the major and minor units correctly - that's
why I wasn't getting any number on the scale except the 0.
I got it now thanks!

 

[David Biddulph]

Glad to hear that it works.
--
David Biddulph

Oops I apologize David, it does work. In the numbers they'd put in the
graph,
they were reporting minutes like hours and seconds like minutes. I was
comparing apples to oranges...
and otherwise I wasn't entering the major and minor units correctly -
that's
why I wasn't getting any number on the scale except the 0.
I got it now thanks!