Thread: Metric Vs Imperial

Originally Posted by ozwinner

I like it best when you call out to someone else on the site, its 3 foot and 32 mm.

Al

You'll get me all nostalgic about the times I spent on sites. I used to like even more the kind of answers you'd get when you told someone it was "3 foot and 32 mill".

Col

I grew up with imperial and can use it and understand it when watching Normie, albeit at times with a little thinking music ....... yet always will be a metric man - I find dual measurement tapes a pain in the proverbial.

Was fun for me when I was a kid though (and this is why I love metric) my train layout - it was in a scale called Dublo (00) which is 4mm to the foot. Isnt that a classic? The USA version of it is called HO which is 1/8th inch to the foot.

Am trying to find some old second hand train sets again now to relive those fun-filled years........ coz I need yet another hobby/project!

Originally Posted by derekcohen

I'd like a metric measure that has subdivisions. One that is marked clearly at 25, 10, 5 mm units, not just at the 1000 and 100 points.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Thats why we have cm's!

Originally Posted by derekcohen

1" is a relatively large unit, and it can be broken down into 1/2" or 1/4" or 1/8" or 1/16, and even 1/32" if you really want. By contrast, I find taking a measurement of 32mm much more difficult. Is it really 32 or is it 33, perhaps only 31 - oh bugger it, I'll just call it 32mm!!!

I'd like a metric measure that has subdivisions. One that is marked clearly at 25, 10, 5 mm units, not just at the 1000 and 100 points.

Regards from Perth

Derek

That's 0.8mm
The only reason we still have both systems is because the Americans are commited to Imperial and the reason building dimensions are expressed in mm(thousands of them some times ) is so that defecating flies don't cause monumental boo -boos . When they happen wev'e got to blame something else.

I'm in the generation that started using Imperial measures and was "converted" to metric. That happened in fourth class IIRC.

I still have trouble visualising how far 30 meters is but I am quite comfortable with millimeters in smaller quantities.

My current project is in Imperial measures because the plan was in Imperial measurements but I prefer to work in metric. As I don't usually use plans from other sources without major modification this usually isn't a problem.

Personally, I think that this is in the class of the text editor (emacs Vs vi) wars in the Unix world (if you're a computer-wallah like me you know where I am coming from). There is no one right answer. Both do the same thing in varying degrees of complexity.

I've had to work with both because of machinery coming from all over the world but metric is the way to go....except for two things. I still think in Miles Per Gallon (or know what is good/bad economy in Mpg). I'm learning that 10Litres/100km is roughly 27Mpg. And when it comes to machining I only think in thou??. I can't relate well to metric when machining, I always know how much 5 or 10 thou is. The rest is fine.

For woodworking Metric is bettera and the yanks refusal for all the Bulldust arguments they trot out is utter crap.

Cheers

Wasn't it the Cousin's confusion between metric and Imperial that sent one of their squillion dollar mars probes smashing into Mars a few years ago?

Instead of landing gently on the surface ?

I think that the timber/building industry made things very difficult for themselves when the conversion from imperial to metric was implemented. Instead of changing over to metres, they went to the incongruous nearest equivalent to the old sizes (as previously mentioned in this thread) and we buy boards and lumber in 300mm (1 foot) increments, thicknesses in 19mm (1 inch less 1/4" for the dressing all round) increments, screws and bolts in 6.5mm (1/4") and so on. Sure, it made it easy for the manufacturers to keep all their old machinery but it obscured the main advantage of metric, that is the ease of addition and subtraction, so the old chippie who could easily visualise a "2 by 4" or could figure out that he could get 4 2 foot pieces out of an 8 foot sheet found himself trying to divide 600 into 2.4 metres. Having worked in imperial up to my 20s, I still find it easier to visualise sizes in feet, yards or inches, but easier to work in millimetres, particularly when subtracting. Fractions of an inch, especially 32nds & 64ths, when the span the whole inch usually result in a miscalculation, or I have to get out the tape or rule and count the bl00dy divisions!
Why is it that, 30 years down the track, we still don't buy board materials in 1.25 x 2.5 m sheets or dressed timber in 20x50 sections by the half metre length increments? Even the packaged screws and nuts are still Whitworth threads.
End of rant (for now)
Graeme

Originally Posted by Peter36

That's 0.8mm
The only reason we still have both systems is because the Americans are commited to Imperial and the reason building dimensions are expressed in mm(thousands of them some times ) is so that defecating flies don't cause monumental boo -boos . When they happen wev'e got to blame something else.

your logic flies in the face of defecating booboos

which is smarter than the average bugger

I was bought upon the imperial system and feel comfortable with it. But I have been using the metric system for many a long year and have no problem with that either. I don't really care which system the world uses. I just wish that the world would use one or the other.

The real problem is the Americans. I have a lot of books and plans from American sources which are in Imperial measurements. And so far as I know they are the only country which has not changed to the metric system for general use. The books and plans are excellent. But before I can use them with my students I have to either convert all measurements to mm for them or teach them to convert to mm themselves. I normally take the second option since it is not rocket science to do so. That said, some of my students would still rather not do it. (eg being told that they have to convert 2 foot 3 7/8 inches to mm if 1 inch = 25.4 mm before they can cut a bit of timber, is not something that the average teenage furniture student wants to do last thing Friday afternoon.)

But it would be easier if we all used the one system. Science (real science) converted to a standard system (the SIS system) a long time ago. It is only the Americans that are dragging the chain.

And even though the conversion is easy,multipying by 25.4 gives odd answers which often have to be rounded up or down which introduces a level of inaccuracy and a further source of potential and actual error.

But the important advantage of imperial for myself is that it is easier to read (but not necessary easier to calculate). 1" is a relatively large unit, and it can be broken down into 1/2" or 1/4" or 1/8" or 1/16, and even 1/32" if you really want. By contrast, I find taking a measurement of 32mm much more difficult. Is it really 32 or is it 33, perhaps only 31 - oh bugger it, I'll just call it 32mm!!!

All of my steel rules have the 5mm increments marked with a slightly longer tick. This makes it very easy to read them. The scale on my tablesaw on the other hand does not and it is a pain to set if you need an odd size like 146mm because you have to count the millimetres to find 6.

agree! and totally tragic icon there dude

Originally Posted by silentC

All of my steel rules have the 5mm increments marked with a slightly longer tick. This makes it very easy to read them. The scale on my tablesaw on the other hand does not and it is a pain to set if you need an odd size like 146mm because you have to count the millimetres to find 6.

Yeah I hate that too. It's one of the few things I dislike about the 10HB

Originally Posted by Driver

Mind you, even after all these years of thinking, talking and working in metric, if someone asks me what size something small is, I'll tell them in inches before I'll tell them in millimetres. What's interesting is that most people, even most younger people, know and understand what that means.

Col

Got to go with Col on this one. Similar vintage to Driver, and switched to metric in school in the mid-60's. I find I still often talk and think in feet and inches, but work exclusively in mm. The one exception since I have come to Oz is reverting to imperial bolts etc, as they are more available, and much cheaper than the metric equivalent. Oh, and an occasional drill, for when the metric don't have the 'in-between' sizes.