Changing Building Materials to Metric

[maradcliff]

NOT....... Whether I use my tape measure and measure a board 80 inches, or whatever the metric equivalant is, makes no difference. The board will be the same length as long as I measure it properly. (and who can read a tape measure that accurately anyhow? To me, anything smaller than 1/16 inch is not visible to the naked eye when it comes to measuring a board. When it comes to machining a precison piece of steel to fit a shaft or whatever, thats different, but that has alwawys been done with precision machines anyhow.

A quart of milk measured in a accurate measuring cup will be the same amount as the metric equivalant.

A 9/16 wrench will fit a 9/16 bolt the just as well as a 12 MM wrench will fit a 12 MM bolt.

What you said makes no sense at all.

Mark

[maradcliff]

If you bend over in front of a mirror, you'll see the OTHER moon

[maradcliff]

OK, here's a question to anyone that knows. In countries that strictly use metrics, how big is a sheet of plywood? Does it still measure 4x8 feet (but in metric)? Do they still space studs 16 or 24 inches (but in metric)? That's what I dont understand. If not, what are the sizes they use?

Mark

[maradcliff]

You mentioned thousandths.... Is that thousandths of an inch or something else?

Lets say my sparkplug gap is 45 thou.... does that mean the gap is 45 over 1000 of an inch, or what? I always thought those drill bits with solid numbers (like 30) rather than fractions (like 1/8") were metric?

[maradcliff]

You know the "Foot" began as exactly what it sounds like. Apparently the guy that created the foot as a measurement had a 12 inch foot in his shoes. This is true.

Now, lets guess that back then, the people were being attacked by wild animals and had a lot of accidents with no medical care available. That means that most people only had 8 fingers or toes. That must be where they came up with the inch and divisions of 4. (just kiddin about this part).

[maradcliff]

Yes, i know it means penny, which you'd think would be "P" not "D", but the guy was probably a real bad speller. However, WHAT DOES penny have to do with a nail? Is that what they used to charge per nail? (Which would be very expensive even today), so I am going to take a wild guess that was the price per some quantity of them.

It's funny, we learn all these things and never question them until one day it slaps you in the face, like this just slapped me....

Mark

[Joseph Meehan]

Since our current system and metric are both 100% accurate, I am not sure I understand your statement.

Metric makes a lot more sense however.

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The switch over, even in building materials can be far less disruptive than suggested.

[John Grabowski]

I noticed that the National Electrical code is now referencing sizes in metric as well as the conventional American system.

[Charlie Bress]

I ran into the other side of that problem some time ago.

We bought a teak shelf system that was made in Denmark. I wanted to screw the vertical standards into studs because this was a fairly heavy item even before the shelves had stuff on them. The horizontal spacing of the standards was determined by the shelf size as the shelves were keyed to the standards.

The whole thing was metric. If I centered a standard on a stud, then the standard on either side just barely lined up with a stud. The fourth standard missed a stud completely and I had to resort to toggle bolts for that one.

All was well until we moved. For three of the standards there were just small holes where wood screws had gone in, but for the last standard I had some ugly holes to patch. Since this was a living room location the patches had to be well done and not slap dash.

Charlie

[Charlie Bress]

I have asked several people from metric countries if eggs were sold by ten or by dozens.

An interesting experiment. We leave it for the student . . .

Charlie

[Tim Mulvey]

d is the symbol for penny. It started a long time ago in England. 16d nails cost 16 cents per hundred. Smaller nails cost less per hundred so you get

8d, 6d, etc.

[bill allemann]

could you give an example of how metric is more accurate? please show the math.

[bill allemann]

in the case of an unmanned probe, Russia's Luna-2 hit the moon first in 1959

[Harry K]

What am I missing? They were toggle bolts so why would you be left with big holes?. All that should be there wouild be a hole the size of the screw. I just remove the screw and let the toggle fall into the wall.

Harry K

[Harry K]

OOOPS! Correction: a hole large enough to pass the toggle - still not a major problem.

Harry K

[marson]

first of all, I'm talking carpentry. maybe you do, but i don't know any carpenter out there measuring in 1/64ths, yards (except when ordering carpet or concrete), miles, nanometers, or microns. my point is that the english system works well for carpentry. no, i don't think nasa should be using the english system.

I used the example of finding a midpoint because we do that a lot. the house i'm building now has a lot of rough openings of 36 1/4. why the quarter? no idea, but i doubt that if we were in the metric system, manufacturers would mend their ways and start sizing things in even numbers to make it a speck easier for us poor brain dead carpenters.

i didn't say that the english system was more precise. I meant that the kind of precision that is required in building a house is easily obtained with fractions. sometimes 1/32 precision is required, sometimes 1/16, sometimes 1/8, etc. Of course i don't think that the english system is more precise. there are more precision options.

i am in fact quite familiar with the metric system. I been to college, took physics and chemistry. passed even. give me a metric tape and a pile of metric materials, and i'd get used to it. probably find some things easier, but i bet you there'd be other things that aren't easier. so don't tell me that metric is always in all ways better. I don't buy it.

[Doug Miller]

OK, so you measure that same window with a metric tape measure and discover that it's 829 mm wide -- do you really think that a calculator is necessary to find that the midpoint is 414.5 mm?

Try a more realistic example: What's half of, say, 33 5/16 inches? That's just a hair over 846 mm. Which is easier to divide by two in your head?

What if you need to divide by three, or five?

And your point is...?

[Doug Miller]

Yes: 0.045 inches.

Nope. That's something altogether different. Google "numbered drill sizes", for example

[Doug Miller]

That isn't anything recent: I know that's in the 1993 Code, and I *think* it was there as far back as '87.

[Ralph Mowery]

So find the center of an opening 31 5/8" in a flash. Or devide a space 20 feet, 2 5/8" into 3 even spaces.