How do measure things? metric or imperial?

[Maker]

The bigger numbers are more dramatic and feel more appropriate.

How about Rankine, a hot day is about 540ºR. Cold temperatures however are worse than Fahrenheit, water freezes at 491ºR

 

[Richiew]

How about Rankine, a hot day is about 540ºR. Cold temperatures however are worse than Fahrenheit, water freezes at 491ºR

Yeah, that makes no sense at all to me. Kelvin is another I can do without.

 

[penfold]

Time -- 1 minute 26 seconds divided by 7 (using the minute as your base, just starting from 86 seconds is cheating )
Angle -- 43 degrees 4 minutes and 12 seconds divided by 4
distance -- (1 3/8" + 9/16" + 17/32") x 6

Most scientific calculators made in the last 20+ years can do vulgar fractions and degrees/minutes/seconds; that said doing anything other than 86/7 is just perverse.

 

[mangocrazy]

I was born into an imperial world, which started changing to a metric one when I was in my twenties. But the biggest thing that converted me to the metric system was how easy it was to understand, being derived from base ten. Also in my mid teens I acquired my first motorbke, which happened to be an early Honda and used easily understood metric fasteners. If the bolt head was 17mm, you used a 17mm spanner. With the Imperial system the bolt head size bore no obvious relation to the BSW spanner you'd need (unless you had a set of AF spanners), so I was a willing convert to metric. Thanl God I never bought the Norton Dominator I was toying with...

Having said that, I'm equally as happy using Imperial or Metric measures, and tend to use the one that suits when doing work that only needs to be accurate to a mm or so. And as others have said, digital calipers do have this handy little imperial/metric button...

 

[gaz1]

you lot should try cup measures for cooking instead of ounces and lbs as weight is measured by volume of a cup some people have to learn these after years of cooking in lbs and ounces

 

[tedmagnum]

I'm 35... Metric is all I've ever know.

When people start talking to be in Imperial I get the theme from The Magic Round- About stuck in my head and then my eyes start rolling around in my head.

"2304th of an Inch if the wind blows west" For example...

Metric is just logical. It's perfect.

 

[colnerov]

It has to be a special cup though

Some imperial measures are just plain nonsense - especially when you have two (or five) completely different measures that have the same name, but differ because they originate from different areas -- dozen, gallon, ounces, etc.

Hi, yes but a cup is a set measurement of 10 fluid ounces or 1/2 a pint. Then of course there is the chain, peck, grain, quart, bushel, furlong, league, gill, cable, dram, link, barrel, perch, firkin, rod, There are others as well.

Colin

 

[doubleboost]

This is sort of measuring
The 12 Bore / Gage shot gun
Is about 3/4 inch
It is actually the size of a lead ball that was cast from a 12 th of a Pound of lead (12 balls to the pound)
10 bore and 28 bore the same
A (4 / 10) shot gun is the actual bore size (.410")
A cricket pitch is I think a "chain"
A fathom is 6 feet
At least we all know what a Pint is lol

 

[doubleboost]

Hi, yes but a cup is a set measurement of 10 fluid ounces or 1/2 a pint. Then of course there is the chain, peck, grain, quart, bushel, furlong, league, gill, cable, dram, link, barrel, perch, firkin, rod, There are others as well.

Colin

Firkin is a belter
It is a measure of Black Gun Powder
(the amount we should all keep) lol

 

[Maker]

Cups to measure things is the stupidest thing ever; You need to measure how much butter to use, go ahead and mash as much as you can into a cup. Now you need to measure flour, do you sift it or compress it in? (After you've cleaned and dried the cup)

 

[graffian]

A cricket pitch is I think a "chain"

A chain is 22 yards, the back of school books had all that stuff printed on them, along with the rod perch and pole....
The different unit's shouldn't be a problem.

 

[ronan]

Don't forget for some engineering maths, rotation or revolutions, such as a wheel or gear are not measured in revs or degrees, but in radians. 360 degrees of rotation = 2 pi radians = 6.28 radians. 1 radian = 57.296 degrees. Radians are the SI unit of rotation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radian

 

[colnerov]

Doesn't matter, you're only making cakes and we all know it's likely that all 13 of them are going to get burnt and fed to the dog

That's what shops are for. Buying cakes.


(In actual fact I can almost cook, but I find it relatively pointless unless there's some form of carcass involved and the wife won't let me cook bacon cupcakes.)

Ahh, making cakes isn't cooking, it's baking. You cook a joint for a meal.

 

[colnerov]

That's why the dogs end up with the cakes then.

 

[DanielW]

Hi,
looking at youtube videos, I see that in the Usa they happily use
inches, fraction of an inch and gauge numbers for sheet metal.
Psi for pressures and so on.

In Uk, how do you measure things?
Do you usually use the International System units or the Imperial ones?



SARTo

The yanks are born to use the old system and rightly so.

Some smart **** in the uk said we should change to metric.....little did people know he was a buisness man.....

before metric you could go into a diy shop and ask for 24" piece of wood,now you have to buy 1 meter of wood to get that 24" piece of wood ending up paying more for that 24" and also ending up with a scrap piece of wood 15"

Biggest rip off since sliced bread.

Mind you my corner diy shop still works with old system so he will give me 24" if I need it and will also do the metre lengths.

 

[ronan]

The yanks are born to use the old system and rightly so.

Some smart **** in the uk said we should change to metric.....little did people know he was a buisness man.....

before metric you could go into a diy shop and ask for 24" piece of wood,now you have to buy 1 meter of wood to get that 24" piece of wood ending up paying more for that 24" and also ending up with a scrap piece of wood 15"

Biggest rip off since sliced bread.

Mind you my corner diy shop still works with old system so he will give me 24" if I need it and will also do the metre lengths.

It was the good old eu who insisted everyone, well nearly everyone, had to use metric. All the new cars here fer instance have the speedos in km, no miles at all.

 

[fixerupper]

Yep, I work with both I guess it's an age thing..... (62 last birthday,how did that happen ?) I went to buy some exterior ply in the summer to make a new hen house , as you all know ply wood in the UK comes in 8x4 sheets or 122x244 ,but the stuff I bought here in Crete came as 122x 250.... Why ?....jeff

 

[KemppiFrog]

Yep, I work with both I guess it's an age thing..... (62 last birthday,how did that happen ?) I went to buy some exterior ply in the summer to make a new hen house , as you all know ply wood in the UK comes in 8x4 sheets or 122x244 ,but the stuff I bought here in Crete came as 122x 250.... Why ?....jeff

I think the 8x4 ply machines were exported from UK all over, hence the standard size. The bigger sheets are perhaps newer machinery? I buy ply in 150 x 310 sheets. (10 x 5ft?) BSP is pretty universal in Spain, France and Portugal, just with metric numbers. Made I laff when buying hose pipe back then, sizes in inches, length in metres. One difference is copper plumbing tube. Comes in even m.m. diameters. 8,10,12,14 etc. Handy, as they fit inside each other. One thing, I work in metric OR decimal, rarely convert.

In the kitchen, 'er, being from the US, works in cups ( butter is measured in 'sticks') so I pinned a conversion chart on the back of a cuboard door. US to UK to Metric.

 

[awemawson]

I'm blessed with feet that are exactly 12" long in shoes. It makes estimating room sizes. etc very easy as I just step it out. And my relaxed pace is very close to 36" giving me a yard measure, and if I stride then my pace is pretty well exactly 39" or 1 metre.

Very handy having built in measuring tools.

Oh and the end joint of my thumb is 1.25" !!!

 

[zzr1200]

I prefer "Imperial", there's something nice about 2 3/4 inches + a couple of bits or 2 3/4 inches plus a nats Bo***ck....

My sons are having to learn to use "Imperial" as my Lathe and Mill are old school proper measurements....so if they want to use them ....."They have to Learn Imperial".....

I do use metric but only when necessary...