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why is the US not Metric

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MadScientist:

--- Quote from: rstofer on December 07, 2019, 10:44:49 pm ---https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1214350/boris-johnson-brexit-pound-ounces-measurements-rule-eu-law-election-pledge

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I suspect the electorate will discover at their relative leisure , that Mr Johnson has a long history of promises and a short history of delivery. Not to mention an unfailing ability to do about turns while proclaiming the opposite.

SilverSolder:

--- Quote from: MadScientist on December 08, 2019, 02:28:31 am ---
--- Quote from: rstofer on December 07, 2019, 10:44:49 pm ---https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1214350/boris-johnson-brexit-pound-ounces-measurements-rule-eu-law-election-pledge

--- End quote ---

I suspect the electorate will discover at their relative leisure , that Mr Johnson has a long history of promises and a short history of delivery. Not to mention an unfailing ability to do about turns while proclaiming the opposite.

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Seems the senile old goats hark back to the days of EU v1.0 (...the Roman Empire, which ruled Britain, and imposed their pounds and ounces on the senile old goats' ancestors).

vk6zgo:

--- Quote from: bsfeechannel on December 07, 2019, 10:41:07 pm ---
--- Quote from: vk6zgo on December 07, 2019, 08:02:50 am ---
--- Quote from: bsfeechannel on December 07, 2019, 02:44:41 am ---
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I assume you did notice however, that they use both nF & decimal parts of a uF, as well as decimal parts of a M \$\Omega\$!

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The filter caps are in µF, the "low frequency" caps are in nF, while the RF-related caps are in pF.

The resistors involved in supplying power are in Ω or kΩ. The resistors that bias the VCL11 tube or convey signal are all in MΩ.

The person who drew this schematic was trying to use the prefixes as a specific unit for a specific application for the same measure, something that the metric system came to abolish. By the way, the nano and the pico prefixes were officially adopted by the SI in 1960. Although you can find them in schematics before that year.

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"pico" as in "picofarads" was in common use elsewhere than EU, well before 1960, & may have been common for other measurements
which would not normally have come to the notice of those working in everyday Electronics.
It seems that the schematic you found was a "transitional' form.

forrestc:

--- Quote from: bsfeechannel on December 07, 2019, 10:14:01 pm ---Responses like "we'll never metricate our road signs because we don't care" serve the US no purpose and make the country look like a land of morons.

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That has never been the meaning behind the statements made.

The question was:  Why is the US not metric?

The answer has generally been: because the economic cost to do so is higher than the perceived benefit at this point. 

There hasn't been a lot of discussion about whether we will *ever* move to metric.   It's all been "we haven't because" or "we're not going to in the near future because", not "we're never going to".   And we've pointed out how we are continuing to increase metrication on an ongoing basis in areas that make sense.    I'd expect everything will eventually end up at least as metric as everyone else is.

With that said, at this point, I'm pretty certain our road signs will never be metricated, and we could possibly never end up selling gas in liters because we are rapidly moving toward the point where neither one will be needed.   At the point the cars are making decisions about how fast to go, they'll have a database of how fast they are permitted to go (probably in km/h) at each section of the road, and speed limit signs will become obsolete.  Even if we don't see self driving cars in the near future, there are many regulatory changes coming which will permit the speed limit to be transmitted electronically in one form or another to the car itself.   See for example the EU mandate to transmit speed limit information to cars by 2022, forcing them to slow down if they are exceeding the speed limit.   Once that tech is in all of the EU cars, the regulators in the US will likely be more than happy to implement some form of it here, even if it's just an audible warning or a dash display of what the speed limit is.   I know that there is work being done for car-to-car communications which will be able to transmit braking information to cars behind so that rear-end accidents become a lot less likely.  I also understand that this is also going to include some sort of speed limit and/or construction zone speed limit information capability.

I personally am already to the point where many of the mileage/exit road signs for me are largely not used.   If I care how far it is, I'm going to have my GPS navigation running, which kindly provides the distance not only in miles or kilometers (depending on which side of the US/Canada border I'm on), but also time.  And yes, I several times a year drive in a metric country.  I don't find either system to be any better than the other.

On the gasoline side, there seems to be a large move to move automobiles from Gasoline to something greener, most likely electric.   So it wouldn't surprise me to see that the number of gasoline stations drop to close to zero over the next couple/few decades.   At which point it won't matter what unit they are selling the gas in.  At that point maybe it will switch to liters.   Who knows, and probably most of us won't care at that point.

tooki:

--- Quote from: bsfeechannel on December 07, 2019, 10:14:01 pm ---Responses like "we'll never metricate our road signs because we don't care" serve the US no purpose and make the country look like a land of morons.

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If "...because we don't care" is what you gleaned, then you are the moron. We have said repeatedly and clearly that the reason for not changing road signs is because there is no benefit to changing them, while the cost is non-zero. You claim there's a benefit, but all you can cite is your own dislike for non-metric units. There is zero cost benefit on vehicles (halfway recent cars let you switch units on the fly), zero cost benefit on signs (it costs no more to make a sign in miles than in km), zero benefit in fuel economy, vehicle repairs, or any other conceivable automotive cost. It doesn't make roads cheaper, nor road maintenance, nor mapmaking, police patrols, or anything else. It doesn't make your phone GPS cheaper. It doesn't improve safety. So why go to the expense (regardless of how big it is or isn't) of changing the signage when there is no benefit?? (Network effects don't apply here: the fact that most of the rest of the world uses km doesn't matter, since we don't trade in highway mileage.)

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