Help with imperial measurements

[Dr.Al]

It is easy to visualise someone who is 6'6" and 15 Stone, but utterly meaningless if they are 2.3m and 150Kg.

That's just what you're used to and nothing to do with the relative merits of the systems. If you spoke to someone who grew up in (say) Germany, they would say it's easy to visualise someone who is 2.3m (flippin' 'eck, that would make my 1.98 metre height seem short!) and 150 kg, but utterly meaningless if they are 6'6" and 15 stone.

 

[fizzy]

Why do Yanks use lbs instead of tons? Fair enough for your bodyweight or sugar but it gets silly when they start quoting 300,000lbs for something

 

[R Kraft]

Many modern people don't use measurements enough to make a difference in what units are used.
To them a thousandths of anything means the same as a Parsec or Angstrom.

 

[mtt.tr]

I think we should just ban metric/imperial tapes and sell metric only.

Let the dinosaurs go extinct.

 

[mtt.tr]

Not the case at all. The whole point of real measurements is that they are/were directly related to a real object. It is easy to visualise someone who is 6'6" and 15 Stone, but utterly meaningless if they are 2.3m and 150Kg. Both systems have their uses, it is a shame that the educational system in this country has dumbed down so that people know so little about the world around them.

That's only because that's what you are used to, Europeans do not need to describe themselves in ft and stone.


One could argue that because you can not use relativity maybe you are undereducated?

 

[Parm]

I think we should just ban metric/imperial tapes and sell metric only.

Let the dinosaurs go extinct.

I don’t know how to work in imperial

 

[mtt.tr]

I don’t know how to work in imperial

I can but it's never by choice.


Who would rather workout half of 75' 5/16th or 1913mm

No brainer

 

[bricol]

As a plumber I'm fluent in pipe and fitting sizes, however a half inch fitting is much bigger than half an inch, so like all imperial measurements, they have no basis in the real world

1/2" nominal bore of sch40 pipe.

Pretty easy to get used to for all the sizes, and with only a little experience, easy to recognise what is what.

 

[bricol]

Not so much just the fluency part, but knowing how to convert between the 2. The rule of 254. i.e. 25.4mm to an inch. Or divide 1000 though by 25.4 is about 39 so 39 thou to a mm. Ish.

Easy for those who are aged about 50 to 60 as they were at school during the changeover in teaching. Even my wife who is 6 years younger than me can't do imperial, but that's no bad thing. Everything nowadays is metric as long as you're outside the USA. Except I recall the railway system still uses miles, chains, yards etc. Oh and the standard track gauge is 4' 8 1/2" Lord only knows where 4 foot eight and a half came from though

What made me laugh a few weeks back was a news article in the US where someone had a hole appear in their floor. The article described it as being "Large enough to fit a washing machine". The first comment was "Americans will do anything to avoid using the metric measuring system"

The one which does rather grate though is when someone describes something imperial as a decimal notation. i.e. 6.5 inches. When did imperial ever use tenths of anything? Halves, quarters, eighths, sixteenths etc but never tenths.

Except you ask a railway guy what the track is measured from to - centers? Inside? Outside? Many years ago I did a little machine to remove the seriously sticky grease they used on drive axle gears of electric commuter trains - axle/wheels sat on some rollers, the gear enclosed and cleaned as the axle was rotated - so I needed to know where to put the rollers . . . and no-one at the railway engineering place in Kent could tell me . . .

Americans can and do quite happily use the metric system - 20 yrs ago I was involved in the JSF/F35 projects over in several locations in the USA . . . metric. I'm in Seattle now, using metric measurements with Americans with no hassle at all.

I even obtained some M18 hex head screws in a day . . . I'm not even sure I could get them that quick in the UK!

They can't spell though - soft drinks sold in liters . . . .

 

[daedalusminos]

I can but it's never by choice.


Who would rather workout half of 75' 5/16th or 1913mm

No brainer

75 foot is pretty large!

 

[ajlelectronics]

That's only because that's what you are used to, Europeans do not need to describe themselves in ft and stone.

QED.

One could argue that because you can not use relativity maybe you are undereducated?

I am able to work in any common measurement system, as my education was not limited to what was "trendy, trendy, trendy" in ejumakashun, ejumakashun, ejumakashun at the time. However I tend to use real units the majority of the time, but can fluently switch into funny money when required.

 

[mtt.tr]

75 foot is pretty large!

Yes div moment meant 75inches

 

[pawsnizzy]

Before I retired from Aerospace as a Measurement Engineer, we often used to quote coulombs per cubic fortnight to baffle management idiots

 

[ajlelectronics]

I can but it's never by choice.


Who would rather workout half of 75' 5/16th or 1913mm

Either is simplicity itself in mental arithmetic.

 

[mtt.tr]

QED.

I love it when people try to impress others by using poncy phrases, I love it more when they use the abbreviated version.

No one is impressed, it makes you look a tit

 

[ajlelectronics]

I love it when people try to impress others by using poncy phrases, I love it more when they use the abbreviated version.

No one is impressed, it makes you look a tit

But then so does unwarranted rudeness.

 

[daedalusminos]

No one is impressed, it makes you look a tit

I love it when someone says one thing and obviously means another

 

[Pete.]

Either is simplicity itself in mental arithmetic.

Yep half of 75 and 5/16" is 37.5" and 5/32

 

[mtt.tr]

But then so does unwarranted rudeness.

Your comment was designed to be inflammatory, you do it often to show at least you hope to show how uneducated we all are

 

[ajlelectronics]

Your comment was designed to be inflammatory, you do it often to show at least you hope to show how uneducated we all are

Not the case at all. I NEVER set out to offend anyone, my comments were meant as always, in a humourous way.