I don't get it, why is metric better?

[graham]

They've been on the market for over 30 years. I would imagine he hasn't bothered to retool.

[Puckdropper]

dpb wrote in news:no3b0l$77g$ [e-mail]:

There's another thing to consider here: when you retool, you risk breaking all your customer's jigs or CNC programs.

Puckdropper

[Puckdropper]

Leon wrote in news: [e-mail]:

Yay! A conversion that doesn't cut off the resolution to something useless! I was looking at wire grommets (for desks and the like) today, and they stated 50mm/2". They were 50mm, but that means the fit will be sloppy if you drill for 2". Either give me a reasonably precise conversion or don't give me one at all.

Some countries have banned the use of imperial units in their metrificiation efforts, which is why you get moronic stuff like this.

Rule of thumb: If there's no decimal points in a dual-system dimension, one of the measurements is wrong.

Puckdropper

[Just Wondering]

Since 10 centimeters is just under 4 inches and a 10 mm length of cable would be just over 3/8", I suppose that would never happen

- who would ever cut a 3/8" length of cable, or a 4" cable for that matter?

[Keith Nuttle]

That is the beauty of the metric system, every thing is based on the meter.

You mentioned Micrometers, millimeters, etc. but for got the nanometers, picometers, Femtometers, etc.

Metric ton 1000 kilograms. If I do something on a small scale and it produces 1 kilogram. I know if I scale it up by a factor of 1000, then it will produce a metric ton.

If the English system would you give some one an 8' length of lumber if he asked for one 8" long. 8 yards for the 8'piece. Works the same in the metric system

If Bob wants a piece of cable 10 centimeters long, and the person who is cutting the pieces cuts it to 10 decimeters, ,or 10 millimeters he should be fired as the pieces would be much to short, when he can see the length that is need fits the centimeter range rather than the other two.

[Leon]

The other possibility was about 40 inches.

[Leon]

But inches, feet, yards, or miles do not sound the same.

Suppose imperial was simply sillinches, billinches, centinches?

Well what makes you think 10 decimeter would be too short? The cutter and Bob are "union" workers. The cutter is not paid to think, he is paid to do what he thinks his boss said and to make the cut precisely.

[Leon]

Give the answer.

A mile minus 1/16"

5279', 11-15/16"

A kilometer minus 1mm.

Hint, the answer can easily be misunderstood.

9999999999 somethingmeter

Or

999999999999999 anothermeter

:-)

[dpb]

On 08/06/2016 12:08 AM, Puckdropper wrote: ...

True, the latter of which is one possibility for the reason in keeping the precision in the conversion; at least for the slides that could conceivably be used in such an application.

[graham]

What it all boils down to is that the average adult is resistant to change and, in the US, is afraid of the metric system. No amount of reasoning will change him/her. Graham

[Bill Gill]

That isn't any kind of an argument. The meter was originally based on the distance from the equator to the north pole on a line passing through Paris. It has been redefined in terms of physical quantities, but that doesn't make it 'better'. In fact it is just more convenient because it is all decimal. That makes it easier to make arithmetical calculations.

Bill

[dpb]

On 08/06/2016 8:02 AM, graham wrote: ...

I think "afraid" is erroneous; "stubborn" and "independent" is more accurate I believe.

While a trained engineer and thus very conversant with and comfortable using metric units, I am also one who is comfortable with the status quo of imperial units in every-day life and would not welcome change. It's comfortable to have things like the temperature and windspeed innately relate to what one is used to as opposed to having to convert from some differently-scaled unit that just "don't seem right!" 20 degrees outdoor air temperature is (and should always be) cold, thank you very much! :) OTOH, that that same air is at STP in some computation involving it is also ok; they're just two different locales and keeping them in their own context is far more natural.

Pressure is another; in the power industry, "balance of plant" calculations around the reactor core were/are typically imperial. 2250 psia and ~650F saturation temperature for primary coolant has real context as well; it just isn't natural in metric. OTOH, inside the core for nuclear cross-sections and all, metric units are de rigueur.

Manufacturing can (and has) converted almost entirely other than for the issues addressed elsethread of the fact that so much was done before the need to convert and that it still isn't cost-effective to actually make the hard, physical change (else't they'd have done so on their own, no government mandate needed if economics is left to drive the decision).

In the US in general public, there's a very strong tradition of independence and resistance against be forced into any position (albeit with the aim by the progressives of weakening that as much as possible).

[Ed Pawlowski]

If you are shipping to Quebec, don't forget the label in French too.

[John McCoy]

Keith Nuttle wrote in news:no4k70$1m42$ [e-mail]:

See, there's an excellent example. The only metric weight units in actual use are grams and kilograms (and mg/ug in science and medicine). By rights big weights should be in megagrams. But they're not, everything bigger than a kg is still measured in kg. The "metric tonne" is just a slang term, which came into popularity because it's essentially the same as a traditional ton of 2240 lbs. Since ton=tonne everyone immediately knew what weight was being talked about.

(doesn't work for Americans, of course, since they're stuck with the short ton of 2000lbs, but ton=tonne works for everyone else).

John

[John McCoy]

Bill Gill wrote in news:no4nvd$obg$ [e-mail]:

An arbitrary fraction of the distance from the pole to the equator is not a useful definition in the real world. No person can visualize what 1/10000000 of the distance from pole to equator is. Everyone can visualize how long a foot is, or the distance from nose to fingertips (a yard).

I'm sitting here drinking a cup of coffee. A cup, 8 oz, is a useful real world measurement, being about 1 serving of liquid. A cubic meter is neither easy to visualize nor particularly usefully sized (the liter, 1/1000 of a cubic meter, is no longer an official metric unit).

John

[John McCoy]

Leon wrote in news:pNidnd9XMaqu0TjKnZ2dnUU7- [e-mail]:

That's probably why, in the real world (and Olympics games excepted :-) ) pretty much everything is measured in mm and km. Hard to get those two crossed up. Altho I do find it amusing to see something specified as being

23400 mm long.

John

[John McCoy]

graham wrote in news:no33k8$khd$ [e-mail]:

That was my first thought, because that's a common problem. The examples Leon gives don't seem to translate to any sensible fraction of an Imperial unit. 3.57mm isn't one of the letter/number system of drill sizes either, altho it's a little bigger than a #28.

Possibly the odd values are accumulated rounding error, due to going metric to imperial and back to metric.

John

[John McCoy]

Leon wrote in news:qISdnV8kkt0j3jjKnZ2dnUU7- [e-mail]:

I think so too...I didn't go as far as 64ths when I looked for a match yesterday.

John

[John McCoy]

dpb wrote in news:no4osb$r6t$ [e-mail]:

This is a very significant point, and is why in the UK so many things are still sold in the odd size of 453g (otherwise known as 1 pound). If your whole plant is tooled to use 1 pound boxes or tins, it's simpler just to change the marking from

1lb to 453g than it is to change the plant to make 500g or 1kg packages.

John

[Ed Pawlowski]

True, but it works against us at times. We want to buy cheap stuff from Asian countries then bitch because it is metric. The little manufacturing we have left wants to sell to other countries then bitch because they don't buy our products because they are not metric.

It is not always about being forced, it is about being sensible to enrich yourself.

Used to buy from a local hydraulics shop when we had older US made machines. Starting in 1989 we added metric. When we needed something for them, the guys at the shop said "if its metric, you're on your own". They went out of business keeping strong traditions.