Is it Time to get Onboard with Metric Measurements?

[Wild Bill Jones]

I am a member of the Footmen. Our motto is stamp out the metermaids. Can’t do thirds with the metric system. It’s based on nothing. At least I can look at my foot and get an idea how long a foot is.

[Glennwillow]

I still do a lot of engineering work. When I provide measurement numbers in a report, I always provide them in both Imperial and Metric numbers. The conversions are easy enough, and if I provide dual numbers, the chance of someone getting the numbers wrong is highly unlikely.

The program I am predominantly using these days is ANSYS CFX, a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) program originally generated in Europe. I have found that it's way easier in this program to use metric numbers, and after using this program for almost 20 years the metric numbers do have physical meaning to me. But I have found that when providing reports on simulation results to American engineers that they insist on Imperial dimensions and seem to be insulted by my use of metric numbers if I do not provide dual units. When I write for customers who use the metric system, I use the metric system as the dominant units. When I write for US customers, I use Imperial units and metric dimensions are in parentheses.

Metric numbers don't have much meaning for me when it comes to guitars, but I suppose if I converted the numbers enough times, I'd eventually get used to metric numbers and they'd eventually take on physical meaning. (However, it might take me 20 years to get used to the metric numbers and I may not be around that much longer. ) Then again, the steel string acoustic guitar is an American development, and Americans have repeatedly rejected metric units for many product lines.

In machine design, bearings are listed in metric numbers, but mechanical seals and lip seals and shaft sizes are in Imperial units. So things are so mixed up, it's pretty hard to force American engineering to shift over to metric units. At the same time, it's so incredibly easy to convert back and forth between the two systems -- I've done it in my sleep for the last 50 years -- that it's hard to believe that responsible engineers could screw up the conversions. Any engineer who designs machinery has all the conversion factors in his head and routinely converts metric numbers to inches and vice versa to do his job. Many machinists have a lot of money invested in measuring tools based primarily on the Imperial system. The typical approach for them is to measure things in inches and then convert to mm if necessary.

Some things have gone over to metric units -- automobiles, for example. It will take time for everything else to make the shift. I have, however, been surprised at the resentments over the metric system by many in the engineering community I have been a part of for the last 40 years. I personally don't care what units we use. They all mean the same thing. Calculators for making conversions are cheap and accurate and most smart phones have a built in calculator. It's not a big deal one way or the other. The medical community uses primarily the metric system; many in pure science have been using the metric system for more years than I have been working for a living.

It will take time but I would guess that the US will eventually change over gradually to the metric system. However, I seriously doubt that this will occur within my lifetime.

- Glenn

[Photojeep]

As an American who was in school when America gave its half hearted attempt to teach us metrics, I can say I prefer imperial because that’s what I’ve grown up with and still use in my daily life. I simply don’t “see” or think in metric units.

Having said that, I do remember driving home from college for various breaks or vacations back in the late 70s and always seeing one road sign that stated it was 100 kilometers to Chicago and in parentheses below it gave the miles (63?)

The only other metric measurement I can seem to remember is that one standard size paper clip weighs one gram. My wife taught me that years ago when she was introducing her 2nd graders to the metric system. Of course now when I come across something’s weight listed in metric units I find myself wondering how many paper clips that might be ...

Best,
PJ

[leeplaysblues]

Originally Posted by loco gringo

There are two types of countries, those that have put a man on the moon and those that use the metric system.

Kidding. Kind of.

'(CNN) -- NASA lost a $125 million Mars orbiter because a Lockheed Martin engineering team used English units of measurement while the agency's team used the more conventional metric system for a key spacecraft operation, according to a review finding released Thursday.'

If I was a USA astronaut for the next moon mission I would be very nervous.....(Just Joking)

[Brucebubs]

Originally Posted by Glennwillow

Some things have gone over to metric units -- automobiles, for example.

- Glenn

All parts except wheel diameters and tyres - they are still in inches.

Renault did make and sell a model here with metric size wheels but that meant owners could only replace worn tyres with the same metric size Michelin tyre every time ... died a slow death.

[menhir]

Originally Posted by justonwo

They* tried this in the 70s in the US. Didn’t take...

I remember. We learned it, but the whole movement seemed to be a solution in search of a problem that didn't exist.

Now that that idea seems to have flopped, they're trying again with roundabouts, the next darling of the different = better crowd.




The next thing you know, they'll want to do something like changing a concept that's been in familiar usage for hundreds of years like, say for instance B.C. and A.D., to B.C.E and C.E. because....umm...because....just because? We'll, it's different.

*I don't know they "they" are, but I wish they'd find a more constructive hobby or just stay home and leave the rest of us get on with our lives.

[jklotz]

Whatda ya got a problem with 33/64th's?

The metric system is far superior to the draconian imperial system. 0, water freezes, 100 it boils. It's based on science and fact, not what some long dead king estimated the length of his foot to be.

We won't see it in my country though. Folks here are slow to change.

[Glennwillow]

Originally Posted by jklotz

Whatda ya got a problem with 33/64th's?

The metric system is far superior to the draconian imperial system. 0, water freezes, 100 it boils. It's based on science and fact, not what some long dead king estimated the length of his foot to be.

We won't see it in my country though. Folks here are slow to change.

Most of the engineering people in England that I interfaced with did not use °C, they used °F. The older guys my age never adapted to Celsius because for them it had no physical meaning. It never did for me, either. When given Celsius temperatures, I just learned to convert them to °F quickly. If a motor is rated for 40°C ambient temperature, that means 104°F.

In my opinion, the metric system is not far superior unless you are used to it. Any number in either system can be obtained within seconds with a simple calculator. People make too much of this. I suspect that's why the US has not spent the in some cases massive amounts of money needed to convert.

- Glenn

[PHJim]

I always was puzzled by the way the Imperial system was invented. Was it a committee?

"What if we pick this length for measuring a piece of string. We could call it an inch."
"Good idea. Then if we want to measure something longer, we could take 12 inches and use that length."
"Yah, and let's call it a foot."
"Great and for even longer distances we could put three feet together. . .and we'll call it a yard."
"Sure and for really long distances we could put 1760 yards together and call it a mile."
"Good, then it's settled."
"Except if we're traveling by boat, then we'll use 1/60 of a degree of latitude along any line of longitude and call it a nautical mile."

Canada converted to Metric in the early to mid-seventies, but even now lumber is still sold by the foot. We still have 2 by 4s and houses are built with 16" stud centers and drywall still comes in 4 X 8 sheets.

Temperature is always given in Celsius and speed limits are in kph. The doctor measures your height and weight in metric, but most folks still think Imperial for height and weight.
You can see that even after nearly 50 years, we're still not completely converted.

A couple of Cobourg, Ontario children's entertainers, Paul Caldwell and Brad Halls, who called themselves the New Kids On The Block, long before the boy band, wrote new words to Five Foot Two when the change started being taught in school in the early seventies.

She's a centimetre shorter than a metre and a quarter,
And ev'ry millimetre is in perfect working order,
Has anybody seen my gal

I know I'm only human but I still have the acumen
To know her eyes are flashing 'bout a half a million lumen,
Has anybody seen my gal?

A pair of gorgeous gams on her fifty kilograms
When she twirls her skirts.
My chest just thumps and my heart rate jumps
About a hundred kilohertz!

But Fahrengrade or Centiheit,
She's gonna light my fire tonight,
Has anybody seen my gal?

[Tannin]

Originally Posted by loco gringo

There are two types of countries, those that have put a man on the moon and those that use the metric system.

The really daft thing about this statement is that the Apollo Guidance Computer - the thing that did the really hard yards of figuring out the landing, absolute state-of-the-art computing 1969-style - was fully metric. It was right at the bleeding edge of what a computer could do back then, and one of the optimisations they made to help it calculate trajectories fast enough to be useful before the lander crashed was to do all internal calculations in metric units. The display readouts then converted the metric results into imperial units for the convenience of the astronauts.

This was a sensible way to work things: metric for the computer because it is faster and less error-prone; imperial for the astronauts because their background was flying in the US armed forces which still used imperial units. Much better, for this critical one-time task, to let them work in the unit they were comfortable with.

As for guitars, yes, metric measurements are inevitable. Once upon a time, the US market was really large, and a substantial number of smaller markets also used imperial measurements. Hence, imperial made sense.

Today, the US market is a much smaller proportion of world sales and manufacturing, and it is now the only developed country still using imperial - everywhere else has gone metric long since.

[AX17609]

Originally Posted by justonwo

They tried this in the 70s in the US. Didn’t take. It makes sense, but it’ll never happen. What, by the way, does this have to do with guitars?

This is the "Open Mic" section of the forum, where we discuss things not necessarily related to guitars.

[Silurian]

The UK still has some products that are sold with both metric and imperial. I buy milk in a 4 pint (2.27 litre) bottle. Of course we still use miles instead of km.

I doubt we'll ever change fully to metric. No one is going to go into a pub and ask for 0.568 litres of beer.

[Tannin]

No one is going to go into a pub and ask for 0.568 litres of beer.

A long time ago in a town far away, I used to work in a bar.

Two New Zealanders walked in.

"Yes gentlemen."

"Sex tins please."

No problem. I'd met Kiwis before and I knew perfectly well that in Kiwispeak, "sex" means "six". So I was able to reply:

"No worries. You need the bottle shop. Out the same door you can in and around to the right."

"No no, we want sex tins."

"Yep, no problem. We only have draft beer here in the public bar, but you can get bottles and cans in the bottle shop. Out and around to your right. Bernie there will look after you: bottled beer, spirits, tins of beer, whatever you want."

"No no. We want sex tin ounce glasses".

Oh.

Memo to self: in New Zealand, "sex" means "six" and "tin" means "ten". Lesson learned.

[Ozzy the dog]

Originally Posted by loco gringo

There are two types of countries, those that have put a man on the moon and those that use the metric system.

Kidding. Kind of.

This is exactly why the US achieved getting to the moon.

The American astronauts only had is 238,900 miles but the rest of the world would have had to go 384,400 Km. It's obviously nearer to the US than anywhere else.

As Brucebubs says, I too find it ironic that the US has been using the metric system for the currency for over 200 years - does this make them the first to use this system?

[Fogducker]

I once asked a man, who was old enough to be in on the ground floor of automotive design(Hey, I'm 82), why ALL American cars have metric threads on their spark plugs (Either 14mm or 18mm) he told me "Because Albert Champion invented the spark plug!"

I think Ford tried Imperial for a couple units, but it didn't work.