Metric vs Imperial poll

[Roly]

13500mm
easy you just read it off, or does he say 43 foot one ferkin inch and a half and a 32 tooth

Ok, ok,ok lets get specific. 98% of the time I work metric,but I get screws in imperial (some) SS tube in imperial, boats are in imperial, I used to shape surfboards in imperial (a coupla thousand) so metric doesn't mean much for s/bd dim.. Glass weights in grm/m^2 but I'm always converting them back to a comparison with 6oz surfboard cloth to get any sort of relativity.
As for month/day/yr that is downright illogical. Wind spd/boat speed gotta be knts, or km/hr or i'm lost, house area in m^2 & all materials in m or mm.
It works

[rayk]

I built boats in feet inches and eighths +/-.
I dont mind metric or imperial really, but imperial speaks to me.

Except for a 24' plywood sailboat. Plans called for 4x8 sheets but local supply was 1200mmx2400mm. Scarfing in another 4 inches of ply each side of the boat was a pain.

Most construction material here is still the old imperial sizes but with metric dimensions.

[lazeyjack]

Originally Posted by Pericles

When I first tried my hand at carpentry, standing by my father as he worked and locating and handing him the correct tool from the confusion on the bench. I learned how to cut and join wood within 1/2" accuracy. Hey, I was five, ok?

I got better at it, but who would have thought that inaccuracy (within limits) would have be a highly regarded trait when building stitch and glue boats?

Some odds.


Pericles

I cracked up so funny, ddi you belt your thumb too?

[Mychael]

I find it's more how I can "visualise" in a particular scale.
For instance in weight I can get a better idea if someone tells me they weigh xxx kilos as opposed to xxx stone/pounds.
For Height if I'm told you are 5'11" I get it better then xxxcm.
Litres or Gallons makes not a lot of difference to me. Same for MPH or KPH but if I'm flying or sailing it's gotta be in knots. Same for navigation, although for calculating time/distance when driving everything in metric makes it easy.
Farenhight or Celcius means the same to me until I get past the freezing/boiling temperatures.
I only understand PSI in my tyres not KPA.

It all comes down to use and familiarity, working on my car I do find it easier these days to go up one size in a spanner in metric then to remember the next fractional size.
I feel metric bolts are easier, hose sizes, not sure.

I recall when you could get plans for some homebuilt aircraft that were either marked in both imperial or metric or you could order plans in your choice of measurement.

Mychael

[yipster]

when miles are mentioned in for example ocean voyages,
how to know if it are land miles or sea miles, estimate?

[nancur373]

I am 25 years old and grew up in Newfoundland Canada. I was taught nothing but the Metric system from day one but....When it comes to construsting anything or talking height and distance is all Imperial for me. It's easier for me to picture 6 inches than 150mm.

[Gerard DeRoy]

Originally Posted by yipster

when miles are mentioned in for example ocean voyages,
how to know if it are land miles or sea miles, estimate?

There is only one easy way, enter the trip waypoints and ask your gps.

[Pericles]

A nautical mile, sea mile or nautimile is a unit of length. It is accepted for use with the International System of Units (SI), but it is not an SI unit.[1] The nautical mile is used around the world for maritime and aviation purposes. It is commonly used in international law and treaties, especially regarding the limits of territorial waters. It developed from the geographical mile. Since the nautical mile is roughly equal to one minute of angle at the equator, the length of the equator is roughly 21,600 nautical miles.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nautical_mile

1 nautical mile = 1852 metres exactly. It is also 6076.1155 feet, but I just work with 6080 feet. A land mile is 1760 yards or 5280 feet

[murdomack]

A Nautical Mile is 1 minute of Latitude anywhere on earth, but it is a minute of Longtitude only at the Equator. A minute of Longtitude at 60deg N or S is only 1/2 a Nautical Mile. That is why the sun sinks twice as fast at the Equator and why you will get twice as drunk going for a Sundowner in Shetland or in Norway as you will in, Equatorial Guinea.
It is so simple, I don't know why anyone needs to measure in Metric.

[murdomack]

As one who was fabricating to API and ANSI standards in the UK long before the oil was discovered I can tell you that in the glorious period before we went Metric, we did work for the oil industry to API/ANSI both for the UK refineries and for worldwide export. We also used a BS code which was more wide ranging than the American system, but contained similar standards if required. Our threads were different of course, but our pipe was Imperial Nominal Bore. The difference in the pipe OD definitely applied to the 6" nb which is 6-1/2" against your 6-5/8". I thought for years that the BS 8" was different OD as well but it does not appear to be. I am not sure if there was, then, a separate BS standard for 6-5/8" OD or if we had to specify API/ASME, but it was very common and we used it every day on oil industry contracts. There was and still is a difference in some other sizes, notably 2-1/2" and 5", but the 6" was the more obvious as it was used a lot. I have found that the KS and JIS standards still use an OD for 8" pipe that is slightly over 8-1/2", so it may be that BS also used this tooling in the past.

I went over to Germany in 1972 to work on a copper smelter, just about the time we were converting to Metric. All my life I had been told about the great German engineering standards, how you could drive a VW beetle off the production line at 70 mph and not damage the engine, and ever since that day I have seen Metric as second rate to Imperial. They had no standards. They used to measure all the fittings individually as they were all different. In the UK we had factories turning out fittings to the standards we have today and I know that the US had the same. What really struck me was that we had quick methods of measuring and setting out which had been developed through the Imperial system, but they had no smart craft knacks. The tradesmen brought up in the UK in the post Metric era try to show me smart tricks that have been developed, but when I get my chalk out and we do the sums I can get more accurate answers more quickly with my old Imperial tricks.
The Europeans and the Japanese based a lot of their dimensions on BS and their pipe threads are still BSP with a new name, ISO. All they have that is different is the Metric dimensions of their flanges.

I am fortunate enough to have spent the last seven years working for an American Oil Project overseas. I am delighted to say that the Imperial system is still alive and a delight to work with and would encourage all sane Americans to stick with it or they will end up like the UK with a lower standard of workmanship and no pride in their trades.

Originally Posted by Mike D

Paul

About 25 years ago the North Sea oil boom started and it was really driven by Americans who had the experience in offshore drilling. When their design engineers began to try and use European standards they threw them out because there were so many it would have created havoc in trying to build modules in different places. (There was also the usual crap that ABS and USCG MODU regs weren't good enough for the Europeans who all began to write their own standards anyway.)

So they began to use the normal API and ANSI standards common on rigs. This accelerated moves in European yards to standardise as there was no such thing as a metric standard in the same way that there was no inch standard.

For the same reason that MacDonalds sells burgers in Paris and Coke in Seville the US piping began to make inroads into Europe. The best European Standards group was the German DIN which grouped the US standards into three lots depending on the scope and availability of associated fittings. So the groups were

• Full range of fittings for a wide range of pipes
• Medium range
• Small range

This became the new DIN standard and the sizes were the US standards simply converted into mm. For some reason I could never 1.8288m they changed a few, I think out of all the US sizes up to 10" Nominal they used a different 6" and 8" but I am not sure now.

I must admit that I don't know what was adopted throughout Europe but I know yards in France, Germany, Holland and Norway that were using the DIN standards. Machine manufacturers were also trying to standardise on the pipe connection fittings.

Happy daze
Michael

[ancient kayaker]

Lovely thread; don't know how I missed it so long. The mob has spoken, metric it is. Probably for the best really, as the guys brought up in Imperial units had a good enough education to work in either

[Wynand N]

Originally Posted by murdomack

I am delighted to say that the Imperial system is still alive and a delight to work with and would encourage all sane Americans to stick with it or they will end up like the UK with a lower standard of workmanship and no pride in their trades.

Bullshit, how can a measuring system bring about lower standard of workmanship Bad artisans always blame poor workmanship on the tools... Perhaps is is the punk generation that started during the 70' in the UK that bears fruit now

[Ad Hoc]

Wynand N

Exactly...whether one wishes to use, Chain, Birch, Pole, Cable, Furlong, Inch, Yard, Metre, Angstrom, par sec etc makes no difference. Crap is crap, whatever system one uses.

[DMacPherson]

Imperial is "organic", SI is not. SI is easy to numerically manipulate, Imperial is not.

I recently read a very interesting book about the history of surveying. Basically, it was an "homage" to the chain. One point made very clear, however, was that the historical move to SI was about political power. While the populace was comfortable getting to one-eight by dividing something in half three times, the "bean counters" of the aristocracy pushed for a decimal-based system to better keep track of taxes. Then, to distinguish themselves from the monarchy, the new republics reverted to something more akin to Imperial. And then, as new countries emerged from the republics in the late 1800's they wanted to "play with the big dogs" and formally adopted SI - even though the transactions in shops typically remained with whatever traditional system they had in place.

As a recent poster nicely stated, the system of units should not be an excuse for anything. As we move to a decimal society, SI just makes sense for doing calculations. Having said that, all of my clocks and watches are analog. A "quarter to five" is more meaningful to me than "4:45". I divide my pizza into eights, not tens. Even in thinking about a propeller blade's angle into the flow during its rotation makes more sense in quarters or eights, as there are singular positions (min, max) at the one-quarter and three-quarter positions.

Imperial is more "natural", SI is more "mathematical". Use what you will.

Regards,

Don MacPherson

[Fanie]

As a kid we used the inches and feet thing. Switched shortly after and never looked back. The only time you still use inches is when you tell a chick what she's in for... you know, so many inches.

Other than that the old system is pretty useless. Imo the US will pick up their economy when they come right and start the metric system

The English are said to have switched to metrics, but they are still clinging to their pound