EU to ban imperial measurements

Regrettably, it's largely true.

The latest effect is to outlaw the use of 'supplementary indications' i.e. the use of dual units of measure. At the moment you are allowed to describe something as, say, 25.4mm (1 inch).

From 1st January 2010 the unapproved supplementary indication, in this case the inch reference, will not be permitted and all that can be displayed in sales literature etc. is the metric measure.

Whether the existing exemptions will allow the use of imperial descriptions for, for example, 7/16" UNF threads I'm unsure.

"Article 4 The use of units of measurement which are not or are no longer legal shall be authorized for: ? products and equipment already on the market and/or in service on the date on which this Directive is adopted, ? components and parts of products and of equipment necessary to supplement or replace components or parts of the above products and equipment."

Could you advertise a 7/16" UNF tap? I would read it that an existing manufacturer could, but no-one else could add such an item to their range.

It does sound utterly crazy - typical unnecessary EU meddling.

Well it's already happened hasn't it? That guy up north, the metric martyr, was prosecuted for selling bananas by the pound. Fruitcakes and loonies we may be Mr Cameron but those of us that support UKIP would like to see an end to all this EU junk.

TonyB

I would say that the 'product/equipment in service' is the UNF thread system and is [clearly] already on the market and can still be labelled thus. There's nowt to fret over here IMO, sound more like a case of mischief making IMHO. No wonder the gubbinsment don't take these petitions seriously!

Julian

Frankly, it's about bloody time that Imperial measures were finally laid to rest. They are inconsistent, awkward, require mathematical olympics to be able to use them in anything but the most trivial application, and a serious anachronism. The only area where they score out over metric is in fractions (given that twelve and sixteen have more factors than ten), but given that most people use calculators and computers (which don't do fractions very well), this is now also obsolete.

It isn't even as though Imperial measures are standardised globally - the US measures are different enough from the UK equivalent to make machine parts completely incompatible.

Stuart

metric martyr,

olympics

metric

(which

globally -

But you forget the HUGE number of items that exist that have been made to Imperial sizes - for instance most of the housing stock of this country. If the metric system is better (and it certainly is is some arenas) then it will take over and the Imperial measurements will slowly fall into dissuse. I find myself increasingly using metric measurements in my (hobby) engineering workshop, but don't feel the need to scrap my Imperial rules, micrometers, verniers etc. Absolutely no reason to ban Imperial measurements unless the political agenda triumphs over the practical, which of course it does evey time with the EU !

AWEM

Yes, I wasn't very clear perhaps. It IS essential that the "legacy" things remain, but why people persist in using imperial for new stuff (and selling fruit!) is beyond me. Imperial measures and spares must remain for things like the aircraft industry, where conversion to the nearest metric equivalent is impossible without retesting and reissuing flight safety certificates, and indeed classic vehicles, but it should be possible to convert old cars to mostly metric as parts are replaced - hell, my old Series IIs were a real mixture depending on what the previous owners had to hand :) As I read the leglislation quoted above, the rules specifically allow for this retention of existing part supplies (and do not, IMO, prevent new manufacturers producing old sized parts). In fact, most industries have been producing metric size compoenets in new products since the 80s, so in fact this seems to be Europe catching up and formalising industrial practice - which they seem to be adept at doing.

Stuart

Does it matter, really?

I've used a mixture of imperial and metric all my life (47) but frankly my sons (12 and 15) haven't a clue about imperial and really cba to learn it as it _is_ a dying system.

I know there are areas where imperial will always (possibly) be used, but complete metrication for _new_ manufacturing is probably a good thing in my book.

YMMV ... ;)

They ought to, since maths classes in schools still teach imperial measures alongside metric (at least they did a couple of years ago)

Stuart

This sounds like those idiots like the so-called "Metric Martyr" who don't actually bother reading the rules, or thinkning them through.

For example: I'm going to sell apples by the Tribblit. A Tribblet is 1.5 Kg. I'm perfectly at liberty to do that, the law only requires the price is also displayed in Kg - as long as that it there I can use *any* unit of measurement, for anything, that I choose, or invent.

The directive doesn't ban anything - it simply lays down, amongst other things, what letters etc should be used to inicate quaintity etc. Science has been doing that for decades, it's just the rest of us catching up.

Post 2009 nothing actually changes, except some UK only (even inglobal terms) exemptions disapear. It in reality means nothing - a road sign can give a distance in Chains, as long as it also gives it, most prominently, in metres or Km

Richard

What is a "metric equivalent", there is nothing "better" about a shaft being 9.525 mm rather than 3/8" - and reading "3/8" is a damned sight less easy to read wrong on a technical drawing than 9.000 mm, (or was that 8.000 mm). Imperial dimensions are much easier to carry around in your head in my experience, because of the natural progression of units. Remember you shouldn't use centimetres, only metres or millimetres are your units of length - thats the SI standard, and a 1000:1 scale range is a pain. Which is easier to visualise 30 PSI or 207 kPa ?

I routinely design our scientific instrument in both systems, somethings are hard to obtain in imperial sizes, somethings like pipe fittings are still dominated by BSP - even in France. Exotic metals - even those we source from places like Russia and China, come in imperial diameters - and metric lengths. You don't want to waste money machining something down into round metric units.

I work in both systems, metric/SI for all our theory work, metric/imperial for design work and pure imperial when I feel like it.

101s are largely metric BTW.

Saying that things are easier these days because we have calculators is rather missing the point. Our system of units evolved to suit the tasks it was used for, rather than being fiddled from some mis-formed idea of new-ness after the French revolution. That we needed to rationalise the imperial system is not really debatable, but the Americans managed it nicely.

Curious too how so many metric units are closely related to their imperial cousins. A metre is 10% bigger than a yard, a kilogram 10% bigger than a pound etc. The French even tried to metricate time, but that found no favour at all.

And light still travels nearer 1 foot per nanosecond - nice round number, than "30cm" or some other contrived unit.

Steve

A kilogram is 10% bigger than 2 pounds

In news:4bc5dd74e% snipped-for-privacy@btconnect.com, beamendsltd wibbled :

Maybe a tonne but not a ton, shirley

1 tonne of water is 1 cubic meter (SG=1) . A _ton_ is 20cwts/2000lbs (I think - 240lbs short)

BTW for a laugh:

4 fluid oz = 1 gill 4 gills = 1 pint 2 pints = 1 quart 4 quarts = 1 gallon 31 1/2 gallons = 1 barrel 42 gallons = 1 tierce 2 barrels = 1 hogshead (hhd)

Julian.

That's interesting about the apprent 10% link, but most likely just a coincidence, the entire metric system stems from

1 ton of (fresh) water though, which is 1 cubic metre, and everthing else is x1000 or /1000 (the cm is *not* an SI unit).

Richard

1 tonne = 1000kg = 2205lbs 1 ton or "long" ton = 2240lbs = 20cwt 1 "short" ton = 2000lbs

The "long" ton is what I learned as a "proper" ton in skool, way back. I think the "short" ton was mainly used as a rough measure to aid quick calculations.

16oz = 1lb 14lb = 1 st 112st = 1cwt 20cwt = 1 ton

Absolutely! Sadly though that poor old chap selling the bananas has since died ;(

I might be old fashioned but the metric system seems completely meaningless to me as far as determining measurement goes.

The imperial system was at least based on the human body so you could relate it to size, an inch, a foot, a yard, even a fathom all makes sense, but converting it into metric eludes me.

It has been several years since the following was posted but it does seem to put it into perspective and it is sort of on topic!

Stephen.

Does the expression, "We've always done it that way!" ring any bells? And have you ever wondered how the track spacing for a LR was devised? Read on - -

The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet,

8.5 inches. That is an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used? Because that is the way they built them in England, and English expatriates built the US railroads. Why did the English build them like that?

Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that is the gauge they used. Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons, which used the same wheel spacing.

Okay!

Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts. So who built those old rutted roads? Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (and England) for their legions. The roads have been used ever since. And the ruts in the roads?

Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots were made for (or by) Imperial Rome, they all had the same wheel spacing.

Therefore, the United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specification for an Imperial Roman war chariot.

Specifications and bureaucracies live forever. So the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what horse's ass came up with it, you may be exactly right. This is because the Imperial Roman war chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the back ends of two war-horses.

Now, the twist to the story...

There is an interesting extension to the story about railroad gauges and horses' behinds. When we see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. Thiokol makes the SRBs at their factory at Utah. The engineers who designed the SRBs might have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a tunnel in the mountains. The SRBs had to fit through that tunnel.

The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track is about as wide as two horses' behinds. So, a major design feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's ass.

- - - - - -- - and as a Landy is well known for being able to run on a railway line, one of it's basic design features can be directly linked back to horse's ass as well! So the basic design of a Landy can actually be traced back rather more than 50 years or so. It's actually a

2,000 year old design as indeed I know every time I get in mine.

I think _8_ is the number you need!

Julian.

That'd an awfully heavy cwt, 14x by my reckoning.

8 st to the cwt and 112 lb!

ALL units are contrived in one way or another. And by "metric equivalent" I suppose I meant nearest whole number of whatevers. Exactly how did the Americans rationalise Imperial measurements (genuine question!).

I have as much problem "visualising" 30PSI as 207 kPa, and I can tell you from experience that I find metric micrometers a damn sight easier to read than Imperial, having had to learn both as part of my Engineering degree. As I said, there is no problem keeping things as they are if the component was designed in imperial measures (where I agree, 3/8" is more convenient than 9.525 mm) but new stuff should be designed with metric (in this case, 9.5mm is a suitable measurement, if neither 9mm nor 10mm will do).

As for metricating time, that was simply political to try and do away with the Church - seven day creation and all that.

Stuart