| General > General Technical Chat |
| UK back to "imperial" measurements ? |
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| james_s:
--- Quote from: floobydust on May 30, 2022, 09:10:13 am ---Canadian engineers are used to working with the different measurement systems, it's no big deal. USA is right next door. Old measurement systems are intuitive whereas the Metric system I've never been able to use sizing things. Degrees °F has almost twice the resolution as °C, sometimes I like it better for indoor temperature differences. Not to debate which system is "better" but eyeballing something in the metric system I find gross. Let the King's foot live on! --- End quote --- I work pretty much fluently in either one and don't have a particularly strong preference one way or the other. For some applications metric is clearly superior, for a lot of other things it doesn't really matter. I do prefer F for room temperature and weather due to the resolution aspect but even that doesn't matter too much to me. At a house I rented for a while around 20 years ago the electronic thermostat somehow got set to Celsius and I couldn't be bothered to figure out how to switch it back so I just left it that way. I've never really understood why some people get so passionate about the topic. |
| IanB:
--- Quote from: TimFox on May 30, 2022, 07:17:37 pm ---From that UK legal source: "You can display an imperial measurement alongside the metric measurement but it cannot stand out more than the metric measurement." --- End quote --- I think the point is that if you are selling loose goods from a market stall, you are not going to go to the effort of displaying prices in £/kg and also £/lb. It's just not practical. And you cannot choose either or. If you display only one, it has to be metric. Furthermore, automatic point of sale equipment can only work with one or the other, and is calibrated with one or the other. So while "in theory" you can use the old measurements, this is something of a pointless provision in practice. You will not find any market traders or deli counters showing weights or prices in pounds and ounces any more. |
| tggzzz:
--- Quote from: TimFox on May 30, 2022, 07:38:17 pm --- --- Quote from: floobydust on May 30, 2022, 07:19:57 pm ---I find the US is not metric. Example Bud Industries all dimensions are inches. Cringe. Even though they're made in Asia. Hammond is a one button click for Imperial or Metric units. What's so hard about that. --- End quote --- So you would rather they change all their drawings, which are now "even" in inches and use US sheet-metal gauges, rather than do the exact conversion (since 1 inch = exactly 25.4 mm) on your calculator? --- End quote --- Don't forget "soft metric" vs "hard metric. Thus with ceramic tiles 150mm is the same as 6". Or not. Some buildings will continue to be imperial until they are demolished :) |
| TimFox:
I go with both systems as I see fit. I even own a 305 mm Crescent wrench. When I turned 32 (many years ago), I started converting my age to Celsius. A few years later, I converted to Réaumur. After that, I went to radians. I have now run out of options and can continue to age gracefully. |
| Benta:
The power of the Metric units is, that they all have a common reference/size, defined after the French revolution. All stored in Paris (standard metre, standard litre, standard kilogram etc.). Today, they are replaced by physical/atomic constants with the exception of the kilogram. That one's still being worked on. On the other hand, an inch could be practically anything until 1959. In industry, the inch was standardized by the Ford Motor Company after it bought the C.E. Johansson company and its "Jo Blocks". Those nail the inch at 25.4 mm - yes, mm. So the Paris Metric standard was the basic reference. I think you'll find that all UK and US units are in the end based on the Metric units from the French Revolution. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Edvard_Johansson Note that I'm not saying that one system is better thant the other. A unit is just a unit, use what you feel comfortable with. |
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