For the love of GOD use metric!

[CNCRob]

Originally Posted by Madclicker It's only a 2 x 4 till you measure it!

Then it becomes a 1 1/2 by 3 1/2.

[ynneb]

The irony is, that imperial stems from European measurements taken from a kings foot size, and other odd places. While the Europeans have since taken on the French system of metric, it seems that the much of the USA public is reluctant to get rid of all its ties to the mother land, even if the mother land iteslf has.

The other irony is when you go to install software you get the option to install it with US English or International English. This implies that British English is in the same catagory with the impure international English, and only the Americans know how to really speak English.

[chuckknigh]

But of course we Americans speak english -- the Brittons speak British!

-- Chuck Knight

[miljnor]

Both systems are arbitrary units of measurement no matter where they come from.

One system is just easier to teach. But we here on this forum already know our own respective systems. So there is really no use in arguing someone else’s way of doing it.

The real pain is conversion and neither system is any easier in this respect.

As technology progresses it will slowly change to metric and that is a shame because then we wouldn't be able to argue about how annoying the other is!

[gmfoster]

Originally Posted by Heavy These wonderfull plans are all but useless for us that use the metric system.

I think the above statement is quite a good indicator of the best metric has to offer. It reallly seems more of an international attemp at dumbing down the entire world. I can't imagine anyone that normally uses the imperial system not being able to convert plans from metric and put them to good use.

[martinw]

Originally Posted by gmfoster I can't imagine anyone that normally uses the imperial system not being able to convert plans from metric and put them to good use.

I 'm pretty sure that most people using metric can convert plans in the other direction. (Except Heavy. Are you sure he isn't just trying to get an indignant reaction for the hell of it?)

[newfiesue]

Theres one thing for sure and that is, It got a reaction.

Bill s. (Yorkshire Man, English Man and I guess European)

[sbrpollock]

All kidding aside, I for one don't think that one is system is better or worse than the other, and though I have a preference for the one I learned first, I'm comfortable using both.

It could be that there are disciplines that are better served by one system or the other. For example, in the physics class I recently took, all the equations turned out to be much more elegent when using the metric system. Not that they couldn't be done using imperial, because I did them both ways. In the end I had to admit that metric was better suited to this purpose.

I can't help but think that there are some political roots to these arguments. Those who don't live in the U.S. won't have heard of this, and the young people who do live in the U.S. won't either. But this should jar a few old timers. In the U.S. we used to have two common standards for bolt threads. There was SAE which was the finer thread of the two, and there was USS (Nicknamed "Standard") which was the coarser thread of the two. You could walk into any hardware store say you wanted a half inch standard or a half inch SAE and get what you wanted.

Then the politicians got involved.

The U.S. congress (Yes our senate and house) decided to abandon these standards and come up with a new standard. The fine thread is now called UNF (for Unified National Fine) and the coarse thread is now called UNC (for Unified National Coarse). Now, they didn't change anything but the names. All the dimmensions, thread counts, and geometrys stayed the same!

They are the EXACT same bolts but now with a DIFFERENT NAME!

So now I have taps and dies downstairs in my shop that are marked using different naming systems. How much do you figure THAT cost heavy industry?

So how many think there is some politics behind the whole Metric/Imperial debate?

[paulC]

If you think standards of lengths are a pain have a look at the history of the Gallon.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallon
The 13 or more different "standard" gallons makes the reason most of the world converted to metric self explanitory.

[dertsap]

i live in canada lots of things are in metric here but so many drawings are still imperial
and when they aren t i pull out the calculator and convert it ,metric sucks

[paulC]

Originally Posted by dertsap i live in canada lots of things are in metric here but so many drawings are still imperial and when they aren t i pull out the calculator and convert it ,metric sucks

Conversion sucks. Working in one standard, whatever it is, will always seem better.

[dertsap]

Originally Posted by paulC Conversion sucks. Working in one standard, whatever it is, will always seem better.

agreed