Old money,New money

[mike os]

Learned both... a long time ago... even 1 up on chunko


still use both, but never mix been in so much trouble that way

choosin car tyres is easy for the youth of today.." wannem fekin big shiny rims wid skinni tyas innit" ... or alternatively just nick them in passing......

Car tyres are a right mix "255x16 on a 5.5" "rim... FFS

 

[piman]

Hello Scott,

units of ten like 12" per foot or three feet per yard?

Stalwart I was born in 1947 which makes me 63 in imperial or 75.6 if converted to decimal.

Alec

 

[oz.]

I must be strange then... I'm only 20 and I can estimate inches by sight.

I can hold my hands as 100mm intervals fairly accurately up to 500mm (about this big!) But if someone asked what size screw is needed for something I always reel them off in the imperial way. I can tell the size of a screw by sight, more or less. If someone asked me for a 90mm x 6mm screw I wouldn't know what to pick up. If I see a box of screws with metric sizes on the outside I have to open up the box and say to myself the size in imperial.

I never worked out wheel sizes. I just know that a 195x50x15 works just right on my 6.5J wheels.

 

[Robotstar5]

Then you have folks who haven't a clue, we've had people come into the maint dept and ask for a 5mm bolt, so you go to the rack and show them one, "no, bigger than that" and so on through 6mm then 8mm, "that's the one"!

One that sticks in my mind is a foreign guy came in to borrow a spanner, asked for a No.10??? took a few seconds to work out it was a 10mm spanner he was after.

 

[scott0031]

Hello Scott,

units of ten like 12" per foot or three feet per yard?


Alec

You know what i am saying.


Kind regards,

Scott

 

[""kb]

this reminds me of a time when a apprentice came to me about a job he was doing and I asked him what size he had made it and he pointed to his ruler and said an inch and three of them little bits, lol I could not believe what he had just said as he was a second yr apprentice needless to say he jacked in about 6 months later, we did try to help him

 

[john224]

Hiya ,, Ime 47 - 48 in august ,, when at schoool i was taught in inches But in the last two years 75 /76 they started to teach us metric ,
But before i lost my job it got confusing as got engneering drawings come in to the factory from well known big companys where the drawing are in metric and imperial , I/e 6 mm thread x 2 inch long on a 5 inche long piece of steel with a groove 1mm deep x 1/8 wide - 1 1/2 inches from the end with both ends chamford 1 x 3mm and 1 x 1/8" long and this drawing come from a multi million pound turn over company?
NOW CALL THIS CONFUSING

 

[""kb]

Hiya ,, Ime 47 - 48 in august ,, when at schoool i was taught in inches But in the last two years 75 /76 they started to teach us metric ,
But before i lost my job it got confusing as got engneering drawings come in to the factory from well known big companys where the drawing are in metric and imperial , I/e 6 mm thread x 2 inch long on a 5 inche long piece of steel with a groove 1mm deep x 1/8 wide - 1 1/2 inches from the end with both ends chamford 1 x 3mm and 1 x 1/8" long and this drawing come from a multi million pound turn over company?
NOW CALL THIS CONFUSING

I know EXACTLY what you mean its a daily pain in the ass, not only that it also puts time on the job.

 

[scott0031]

Hiya ,, Ime 47 - 48 in august ,, when at schoool i was taught in inches But in the last two years 75 /76 they started to teach us metric ,
But before i lost my job it got confusing as got engneering drawings come in to the factory from well known big companys where the drawing are in metric and imperial , I/e 6 mm thread x 2 inch long on a 5 inche long piece of steel with a groove 1mm deep x 1/8 wide - 1 1/2 inches from the end with both ends chamford 1 x 3mm and 1 x 1/8" long and this drawing come from a multi million pound turn over company?
NOW CALL THIS CONFUSING

That's why 6" rules are made with English and metric.


I understand your frustration, if you use both systems enough it is second nature, i find it easy to switch from one to the other with no thinking time.

I did some work recently for lets say.............. a very large defence company in the uk. Exactly as you described, I will never in my life understand what goes on in companies with those sorts of resources. I wish they would understand to design you need to know how to make things and it don't work the other way round!

I got this job because it was such a b*****d to do and everyone else had shied away from it. The sort that can bring a grown man to tears. Later i found out all the detail on the part was in fact............ not needed. They cost themselves several hundred quid for nothing. I still find this scenario common to the extent it comes with nearly all jobs these days. Total madness in the day and age of conserving and being green.


Kind regards,


Scott (ward eng)

 

[wyn]

One that sticks in my mind is a foreign guy came in to borrow a spanner, asked for a No.10??? took a few seconds to work out it was a 10mm spanner he was after.

A couple of times i have come across people wanting to borrow, say, a 10mm spanner...but really want a spanner for a 10mm bolt.

I can't remember what the measurements were in school (47'ish this year) but tend to use a mixture nowadays...whatever suits....mm's if it's small and reasonably accurate...inches or a bit of string/welding rod if it only needs to be near'ish.

 

[piman]

Hello Wyn,

"but really want a spanner for a 10mm bolt."

Which is reverting to the original Whitworth sizing of spanners, i.e to fit a particular fastener size. Logical really?

Alec

 

[MrFluffy]

If young folk cannot work with both millimetres and inches, how on earth do they choose car tyres?

The inches for diameter seems to be universal even in totally metric countries, even that stalwart of the metric system france. Where you can find "pneu 18 puces" anywhere...

There is a good historical reason for this, in that the USA passed laws mandating that the DIAMETER stated needed to be in imperial units (as historically there in the cross ply days, there was only one tyre size per diameter available, so if you knew the diameter that was enough), so if you made tyres in metric but wrote the diameter only in inches, they were legal for sale in the us which is the largest tyre market in the world. So a lot of companies making radial tyres did just this and entered the new market there on the introduction of radials.

 

[pidgeon chit welder]

I'm a few days off 60 and back in 1966 at the start of my engineering apprenticeship I had to play inches & fractions as well as micro inches, then system Internationale which was a metre being 100 cm etc and micrometers read in 2.5 Cm's , inches & thousands of an inch , inches and thousandths of an inch , as well as various vernier micrometers then towards the end the SI units simplified to run to 1000mm equals 1 mtr .

We eventually played with the electronic numbering system that confused many ( me included some days ) of , milli ,nano , peco , giga and scientific notation etc. etc.

I have oft measured in brick lengths , inverted wooden V's set to nothing in particular or hand spans of 8.75 inches or 22.25 mm ( ish ) it matters not what the base unit is so long as you understand its relevance to what your doing /thinking of.

Anyone for doing cubic turdometers using a vernier crapometer or natscockhairs ,catzcokairs along with tads , smidgeons and wottlage ???

 

[Shedendman]

Great posts,has made some really good reading,thanks to all of you,keep em coming,i suppose it boils down to what you work with best and for me its metric,not that i knock old money but dont half use the thinking matter up alot

What ever did the romans do for us,lol

 

[Highway_Star]

I was taught, and work, in both.

Some of the machines at my high school, and some of the teachers, were pretty old Consequently some of the machines had dials on calibrated in thou's, they were in the process of being updated/replaced. However the head of techie always made the point that you might go into a workplace, where a perfectly serviceable lathe/mill etc 3 times your age was still in use, and the owner saw no need to change it, and he'd be right.

Added to that my dad worked in thou's at home, hell the old man used a slide rule ir his head. He'd never got into the habit of metric and these new fangled electronic calculators.

It's been a bonus for me, as i work in an industry that has bang up to date gear made in Europe which is of course all Metric, but I also work on old gear and bang up to date gear made in the US, which is of course Imperial. I also drive a Range Rover, which is a right mixture, I think it depended on what Land Rover had knocking around the factory floor at any given time.

I'm 36.

 

[madkayaker]

i work in mm mostly but have has apprentices come to me and say what is a mm. i will use imperial if its a nice round number but when it get into divisions i get a bit lost-ed. but i was never taught imperial as I'm only 25. For fuel efficiency mpg all the way and miles for speed and distance unless out walking in witch case the maps are all in KM

 

[Drains]

Can't think how I missed this thread.
Re the original post, it's no surprise that Kent would delay teaching in metric for as long as possible - the Metric system was one of Napoleons favourite imperialist fancies.

Me- it depends which side of the tape measure is closest which dictates the system used. 25.4 is your friend.

 

[anto]

Im only 26, so a young pup compared to some on here (no offence meant)
I was taught in metric but still use feet and inches simply because i had to as a lot of people still do especially brickies and joiners.

I think it will come to a point where those that use feet and inches will leave the workplace due to retirement and metric will take over eventually.

 

[v8er6.6]

Interesting thread.
I`m a builder by profession , joiner by trade, and I work very happily in both new and old money. Much to the dismay of some of the young apprentices I`ve worked with. At school we were taught in both seeing as I was born in 72 (37 years young). In the wood work department it was always inch, in metalwork it was mm.
If ordering wooden doors and windows, sizes are in inches, ordering plastic doors etc. are in mm.
I suppose it`s what you get used to using for a certain length or span. I`ll quite happily say something is 4", then say the other side is 100 mm good (the "good" being a 1/16" ).
When it comes to area it`s always in square metre`s, unless it`s less than a metre, then it`s square foot.
Anything cubed is cubic metre`s.
Fencing is measured up in metre`s but built up in feet.
Roofs are built up in metric and measured for tiles in feet.

Wherever I`m working, the list is endless .

 

[oz.]

Wood still comes in imperial sizes - Ok they're marked up with milimeters but essentially the sizes are imperial. If you ask for rough 2"x1" that's what it'll be. Then if you move on to PSE (planed clean) timber then 2"x1" is 18mm x 44mm. Where does that make sense in metric sizing. Surely if it was true metric sizing then it would be cut to 20mm x 45mm? Or to be pedantic 40mm

Similar with 'Conti board' (chipboad covered with melamine) Sizes are 305mm or 610mm. Convert into inches and its 12" and 24".

Sheets are measured the same - marked with milimeters bet the measurements only make sense in feet/inches 2440mm = 8' 3050mm = 12' etc.


Metric doesn't feel right if it's not a round number.