Metric to Imperial conversion help

Discussion in 'Fiberglass and Composite Boat Building' started by crossram, May 13, 2013.

  1. tunnels

    tunnels Previous Member

    The imperial system was a night mare in everything!
    weights
    lengths
    money was a shocker and had to use a adding machine all the time .
    I really didn't like maths at school at all !,don't like even now ! :(
     
  2. YoungGrumpy
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    YoungGrumpy Junior Member

    Getting the cloth right size is not that bad. Wait till you see the specs of epoxy in kg, and try to figure the order in 0.98 gallon cans! Then once you dig the weight of the volume in lbs, somewhere in the specs, ask yourself if that number from one brand is the same for the others. Then round it up to be on the safe side, and near the finish of the project (as many non-pro non-trained homebuilders I work too slow), as the weather in the F@#$ New Jersey skips the spring and turns into the summer, ask yourself what to do with 2 cans of fast hardener! Now I either move the work from the garage to the basement or wait till October (or eat the cost of the extra slow hardener that should work).
     
  3. YoungGrumpy
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    YoungGrumpy Junior Member

    On a more positive note, there are soo many things we got from the previous generations that are inconvenient, uncomfortable or plain wrong, and the measuring system is the least of my problems.:D
     
  4. SamSam
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    SamSam Senior Member

    I asked this before and I don't think it was answered.

    Here in the USA, fiberglass woven fabrics are measured in ounces per per square yard, but chopped strand mat is measured in ounces per square foot. So here, a 10 ounce fabric weighs 10 ozs per square yard, but 1 1/2 oz mat actually weighs 13 1/2 ozs per sq yd.

    How does it work in other countries?
     
  5. tunnels

    tunnels Previous Member

    I have worked in a few different countries and been in the industry for 30 plus years its always been per square metre where ever I been .
    Measure per square foot is typically American nowhere else on the planet would think of such a thing !!you guys just love to be different !!:D:p
     
  6. Petros
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    Petros Senior Member

    it was the British that invented it, so do not say "nowhere else on the planet". Besides, I think they still use it in south Yemen.

    As a measurement system it is somewhat awkward, but when it comes to horse power and torque calculations and conversions, the BTU vs. HP is actually a much easier system to use and manipulate as compared metric. Watts, joules, newton-meters, etc. can be troublesome to quickly understand. So it does have some value and I think why it has lingered so long in the USA.

    I work with both systems, and I actually prefer the foot/pound/horsepower system only because I am used to it. but more important is I think it is more intuitive in terms of understanding if the output is way off or not. It feels more natural than the constructed metric system of power/energy conversions.
     
  7. Tungsten
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    Tungsten Senior Member

    Funny how different parts of the world say things different,4x2 never herd of such a thing.We here in Canada would always say 2x4 as the US would also be the same.
    Try Imperial gallon or US gallon, yikes!!

    On my GMC truck built in Texas, USA.The on board options for display offer two kinds, Metric or English.
     
  8. tomas
    Joined: Nov 2012
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    tomas Senior Member

    What's wrong with our fractional drills and wrenches?

    Hand me the eleven-thirtyseconds hex socket please...
     
  9. viking north
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    viking north VINLAND

    In school and in work i've used mostly the Standard(Imperial) system. When Canada officially changed to metric I still used the Standard system in electronics and construction because it was still the common measurement in the country with exception of working on your Volkswagen or a Japanese made auto. Correct me if I'm wrong here but I think there was another automotive tool size on the go also -- something we used to call English sized wrenches for those English imports. Anyhow my greatest challenge was not understanding the Metric system but equating it's measurements to the Standard system that was programmed in my brain.I think the first tie in was the Meter --My brain relates Oh thats roughly a Yard, Next was speed 100KPH , my brain relates- Oh thats roughly double my real speed which of course was in MPH. Then there were the metric wrenches and again 13mm --my brain thinks close to 1/2 in. and from that I could roughly select the metric wrench size i needed for a certain nut. Eventually I became comfortable with most metric measurements and while I still use the Standard system for general everyday measurements , I prefer the metric system for accurate detail work. However Liters per 100 Kilometers just doesn't cut it with me for fuel milage. I always have to convert to MPG. In this case you U.S. guys have an advantage in relating as your smaller volume Quart is almost exactly a Liter. --So possibly it should have been called a U.S. Liter :D

    P.S. here in Canada all building materials are still in Standard (Imperial) sizes however I measured a 2x10 on the weekend for use on my sons deck and it measured exactly 1.5 x 9 so possibly we now have a Canadian Metric System ???
     
  10. Petros
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    Petros Senior Member

    yes, great, what is the next size down....quickly?

    We can thank the English I think for the traditional and ancient Architect's scale, feet, inches and than fractions of an inch. Really difficult to use for most analysis. In most engineering applications they either went to feet and decimal feet (land surveying), or inches and decimal inches (aircraft construction). If the units all stay the same it is easy to work.

    For some reason in the construction trades they have resisted any change from the clumsy feet, inches, and fractional inches. Probably because the architects still think they are in charge.
     
  11. PAR
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    PAR Yacht Designer/Builder

    Most architects I know think in metric and develop plans in both SAE and metric. In this country SAE dominates the less refined labor based manufacturing, but at the other end of this scale, such as preassembled units, devices, appliances, etc., everything is metric, even if they do come with an installation guide, showing SAE for the ham handed installers to use as a reference. All my plans are in both SAE and metric, but I have to think about metric most of the time, while I'm so comfortable with SAE, I can tell just by feel or look what size things are. It's all just a point of reference, depending on what you're comfortable with. I find no difficulties with either system as the formulas and calculation fundamentals are still the same. Simply put, understanding of why you want something to be inversely proportional to a square root is the goal, regardless of the systems semantics or base. Yes, metric can be easier to work with, but it's really irrelevant, without the fundamental and underlying math understanding, which most just don't have. In short, if it's not on a tape measure, most can't be bothered with it, let alone understand its need or usefulness.
     
  12. Eric Sponberg
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    Eric Sponberg Senior Member

    For the US to change to a metric system would require an act of Congress. That will bring out lobbiests from all walks of business and the public, and it will get discussed, debated, watered down, modified to worthlessness, and then forgotten. Legislative careers will be destroyed in the lobbying scandals that ensue.

    But if by some miracle such a measure should get passed and signed into law by the President, then the easiest and most pain free way to adopt it is to change literally overnight. It cannot be done in stages over time--that would create way too much confusion. Do it once, and quickly, and get it over with--kind of like ripping a band-aid off in one quick stroke instead of peeling it off slowly.

    But the lynch pin here is Congress--a metric system is just not on their radar, and probably won't be for a long, long time. So we are stuck with the system we have.

    Get used to it. To put PARs statement another way, if you have gray matter between your ears, you'll figure it out.

    Eric
     
  13. PAR
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    PAR Yacht Designer/Builder

    For all practical purposes, the USA is metric, even if the majority of the over 40 population don't realize it yet. Industry, the military, schools, you name it, they've all covertly converted years ago. Congress has acted previously (Metric Conversion Act of 1975 ) and though Regan gutted the program, it's been modified and implemented in other ways, typically through American National Standards Institute, U.S. Metric Association, the Department of Commerce, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology efforts. Other less direct legislation such as the Omnibus Foreign Trade and Competitiveness Act (modifying the Metric Conversion Act), Fair Packaging and Labeling Act and others, continue to slowly bring the baby boomers on line with metric. Just look at the terminology used in computers and related technology, it's SI, not SAE, even if monitors are still classed by a diagonal inch measurement. This gradual cross over and over lap, has been an intentional attempt to bring on "metrication" (yes, it's a real word) within the USA and the other two or three countries that haven't signed on with SI. If you think SAE is confusing, have a look at Japan's building industry dimensioning. It makes SAE down right lovely.
     
  14. tunnels

    tunnels Previous Member

    Not just a pretty face !!

    I worked in Japan for a while in the building industry and I found the older houses were really easy to work in . The guy I worked with showed me how a lot of the joints were set out and done . building a old wooden styled house was absolutely a breeze !! the timber arrived and had been stacked on the truck in order of how the house was to be built each piece has a marking and what end went where . 4 people assembled it while 2 of us unloaded and gave then the timber !
    when truck was empty a second one arrived and the same thing just continued on . By the end of the day we had the whole framing up for the house and was time to go home !!. This method continued virtually throughout the build of the house two storied on top of a concrete block base !
    Big timbers with slotted joints and locked in place no nails just the occasional bolt to hold key parts .
    I got to use all there gauges and sliding rules for marking out and making some of these fancy joins and with a hammer chisel and 3 skill saws with superfine thin blades all pre-set for different depth's of cuts it was a absolute breeze . There older houses have set measurements and you can measure along a wall in any room in almost any house and find wires and pipes and wooden posts and beams because of there system of building nothing ever changed until recent times .
    When sold my own house in nz I had built a big deck 3 metres off the ground , cantilevered 1.2 metres out so couldn't see the poles from the top . All done with Japanese method of joins for all the timber framing throughout
    All and any season it never moved or made any sound ,was as firm as the day it was built and after 5 years the agents that looked at the house every one asked who made the deck and would they build one for them . .
    Making is all done by eye and making sticks with lines marked on them ,only ever used a tape a very few times in the very beginning never used a rule at all ,small Japanese flexible square all the time . The decking tread timber was the only nailed down timber in the whole deck . All the rest was notching ,double over lapped ,dovetailed lock together joins ,scarf joins with a locking end and numerous other simple and very effective joins for different parts ,all locking and no fastenings necessary, just the occasional bolt here and there along with spit double ended dowels and locking wedges . Its a dream and a pleasure to do !!:):p
     

  15. hoytedow
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    hoytedow Carbon Based Life Form

    I buy my fiberglass by the yard.

    I really like the Japanese saw.
     
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