Thread: UK to revert to Imperial Measurements?

This has been discussed many times before, recently in the jokes thread we have been tealed...


Metric is great for people who prefer not to divide by 12. The issue I have always had with it is the imperial system was developed by engineers (deverloped not invented). For example an imperial coarse thread is coarser than the metric equivelent while there are fine threads finer than the standard metric fine. There are solid engineering reasons for this. Most of the time it doesn't matter, sometimes it does.


I grew up with both. I can use both and think in one or the other depending on the situation but if I had to choose I'd pick imperial all day long.

Originally Posted by woodPixel

This is a Dead Cat issue.

A stinking dead cat is thrown on the table, it distracts instantly from all the other issues.

I know nothing of British politics, but this is only a desperate ploy from another failing government. Just like ours tried it on with Katherine Deves for Warringah Liberals and the attempts at "Boats are Coming!" SMS.

These rancid stinking politics are the distraction of parties at their very end. If there are any tame English here, enlighten us?

Ah yes, the issue: Metric wins. Imperial is dead.

For what it's worth the British never readily like adopting anything that is foreign to their shores.A suggestion of going back to the Imperial system (because it's ours ) is a no brainer considering the moves & possibly time & effort into going down the metric route.Taking one step backwards does not necessarily mean you are going two steps forward.

Guys, despite what the thread title says the UK is never going to “revert back to Imperial” measurements. All BoJo is doing is removing the legal requirement for goods to be priced and sold ONLY in metric units. This means that should there be sufficient demand products can be sold in pints, ounces, feet and inches as well as OR instead of metric units. In reality the only actual changes will be in groceries where they can relabel all the 570ml bottles back to being pints and you can ask for 2lb of bacon and 7oz of cheese at the deli. Possibly some hardware and habidashery may go back to selling in inches, feet and yards again but only if there is enough demand.

I’m a dyed in the wool imperialist. For a very good reason too. When I work with people who use only metric, they all seem to make a basic mistake when measuring and it’s always 10 or 100 mm. They cut things too short because there’s no interim stage in a metre, unlike a yard that had a division f three feet. 3ft 9 1/4in is unmistakeable but1145mm can introduce the 10 pr 100mm error. They do it, I do not. I’ve also got lovely sub divisions if I need them. 10ths, 16ths and 12ths of an inch. You haven’t got that with your millimetres. Same goes for weights. I do have an odd retractable tape measure that measures in U units, but that’s for measuring data racks and patch panels. I can accurately step a yard but not stride a metre and can measure a yard from nose to finger but not the extra 3 inches for a metre.

Originally Posted by Alan Reynolds

I’m a dyed in the wool imperialist. For a very good reason too. When I work with people who use only metric, they all seem to make a basic mistake when measuring and it’s always 10 or 100 mm.

Working in science and engineering for 5 decades my experience has been completely the opposite. I taught students under both systems and my observation was students made more (often drastic) mistakes using imperial than metric. Imperial just added another unnecessary layer of confusion to what is often difficult for students to understand. It also made marking assignments and exams under imperial more difficult because fewer marks were deducted when students selected an incorrect imperial conversion factor than for conceptual or other errors so working out where the mistakes were was not easy. Under Imperial many more obscure conversion factors were required to be remembered so we usually included them at the front of exam papers and there were constant arguments about this amongst the teachers.
Lab work was similar with students make more measuring mistakes using imperial.

The worst was probably heat energy because they often had to interact with (metric) electrical units
so you end up with silly conversion factors like

1 Btu (British thermal unit) = 1055.06 J = 107.6 kpm = 2.931 10^-4 kWh = 0.252 kcal = 778.16 ft.lbf = 1.05510¹⁰ ergs = 252 cal = 0.293 watt-hours

The fact that 1g of water (close to one mL of water), and one calorie will raise that amount of water by 1ºC, is so much easier to remember.

Making and converting imperial measurements at human scales is not so bad but once you get into the realm of the very small or large and lots of zeros are needed then the pico, nano, micro, milli, kilo, mega, giga, terra prefixes win hands down. Of course once can always refer to a "pico ounce" or a "mega mile" but that's just admitting the metric system is better. I was so glad when we switched to all metric in the late 1970s.

It's interesting that in a country like the USA their scientists use metric but their engineers use imperial. One reason US engineers have stayed imperial is because of their existing massive investment in imperial mechanical tooling workshops and operations. With increasing influx of European and Asian machinery and the the increasing need for international collaboration this will change.

I've no doubt some people are quick and accurate at some imperial measurements/operations but that's largely because they re just used to it.. Because we had imperial air flow measuring gear at work nd I used this gear for decades I'm still more familiar with and can better visualise CFM than CMM. But if I was to start from the beginning it would have been more efficient for me to have used metric

Originally Posted by damian

Metric is great for people who prefer not to divide by 12.

Surely that’s everyone?

Originally Posted by Alan Reynolds

I’m a dyed in the wool imperialist. For a very good reason too.

That’s a terrible reason! “People keep making mistakes with this dashed metric system. But I have a solution- let’s use a more complicated system!”

FWIW I asked my brother if he's found any imperial fixings on his Telsa (he likes to fiddle), anyway, seems not, so maybe the US is finally getting their act together.

For those who like imperial I suggest why not go all the way and start doing all their maths using a different number system eg base 12 or hexadecimal (0123456789ABCDEF) is fun.
$1.65 /litre of milk is $1.A7 /litre. Not confusing at all.

Originally Posted by BobL

For those who like imperial I suggest why not go all the way and start doing all their maths using a different number system eg base 12 or hexadecimal (0123456789ABCDEF) is fun.
$1.65 /litre of milk is $1.A7 /litre. Not confusing at all.

Wow; that’s $0.F0C49BA5E353F7CED917 a pint!

Originally Posted by Chief Tiff

Wow; that’s $0.F0C49BA5E353F7CED917 a pint!

US pint or UK pint? Just to emphasise how ridiculous the system is.

I have always assumed we ended up with a "44" gallon drum (rather a silly number) because the US drum was 50US gals. ??

Regards

Originally Posted by Chief Tiff

Wow; that’s $0.F0C49BA5E353F7CED917 a pint!

Reminds me of reading out a list of hexadecimal numbers to a colleague in a lab.
Some of the numbers were hexdec "5FA" (dec 1530) which you can guess was said as SFA.
After that 1530 was commonly used around the lab as an alternative to SFA.

Originally Posted by damian

Metric is great for people who prefer not to divide by 12.

and there I was thinking that the advantage of imperial was that the basic unit (the foot or a dozen) was divisible by 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 12

I believe that Europeans still use "dozen" as a counting measure -- one half-dozen (6) rolls, a dozen (12) rolls, etc -- because the number is so readily divisible.


of course, many surveyors used decimal feet -- where you divide a foot (12 inches) by 10 to get a unit 1.2" long, which is further divided by 10 to get a unit 0.12" long. I'm not sure if thee was ever a unit representing 1/1000 of a foot.

Originally Posted by damian

if I had to choose I'd pick imperial all day long.

But why, if you decision is only based on the units divisibility by 12 and not the other factors -- 2, 3, 4, 6

Originally Posted by ian

and there I was thinking that the advantage of imperial was that the basic unit (the foot or a dozen) was divisible by 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 12

I believe that Europeans still use "dozen" as a counting measure -- one half-dozen (6) rolls, a dozen (12) rolls, etc -- because the number is so readily divisible.


of course, many surveyors used decimal feet -- where you divide a foot (12 inches) by 10 to get a unit 1.2" long, which is further divided by 10 to get a unit 0.12" long. I'm not sure if thee was ever a unit representing 1/1000 of a foot.


But why, if you decision is only based on the units divisibility by 12 and not the other factors -- 2, 3, 4, 6

We used to use river gauge plates in feet and decimals of a feet. Only once, on a precision levelling exercise as a student, did I use thousandths of a foot.