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Thread: Switch to Metric? Yes or No

  1. #76
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    I use both (or either), depending on what I am doing.

    In Canada, we say that we "went metric" many years ago, but in reality, we just added metric to our long in use imperial system. We by 2 x 4 lumber and space them on 16" centers. We buy 4 x 8 sheets of plywood. But, we buy gas in litres and cold meat in grams. We measure temperature in Celsius, but we don't measure pressure in millibars. We use kilopascals, which are neither metric nor imperial. When asked our height and weight, most of us still say 6' and 175lbs. Ask any woman how much weight she wants to lose and it will always be 5 lbs, not 2.5 kilos.

    In short, I don't believe we really converted at all. Maybe in another generation, it will happen, but it won't be in my life time.
    Grant
    Ottawa ON

  2. #77
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    Yesterday I needed to cut a groove on the bottom of a barn style sliding door. The dimensions given on the instructions, both metric and inch fractions simply didn't match what was needed for the floor mounted (finger). I suspect someone on the other side of the pond wasn't familiar with working with either system. I am a inches kind of guy, but I do find myself using the metric side of my 6" ruler on occasion for transferring small dimensions. I don't see the practicality of switching to metric after hundreds of years of records are in feet and inches, or in the case of land records, largely in feet and decimals of a foot. I get the difficulty of using fractions of less than 1/16". Watching Canadian home improvement shows, I laugh every time they refer to a 2x4 or otherwise mix the metric/imperial systems. Then there is the guy who gets xxx liters/km for "mileage". Hey a mile is 5280 feet.
    NOW you tell me...

  3. #78
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    This really is about money. If you consider how many machine shops and other types of businesses own machines that were manufactured with imperial dials, gages, adjustments, etc you have just hit the nail on the head. If your buying new machines and you already have imperial machines in your shop do you really want to mix the two and accept the odds that someone on your staff will make a mistake that could put you out of business. Your staff is already comfortable with the system they grew up with, inducing a major change can be devastating for some.

    Now consider a company that has an inventory of imperial fasteners that could be a hundred million dollars more of less. Drills, taps, toolboxes full of very expensive wrenches, micrometers, calipers, etc. Many trades would be affected by changing a system of measurement that for all practical purposes works perfectly and has for hundreds of years.

    My shop doesn't have one machine that is setup for the metric system and if I was purchasing a new machine today it would not be one that didn't support the imperial system directly, in fact I would not even consider a duel mode machine because of the risk and because I'm just to dang old and set in my ways. I have received requests from government agencies to bid on various jobs the last few years and they sent me drawings with measurements in the metric system. My response was that if they could not send me a drawing with imperial dimensions I would no bid their job. I will not take the chance of making a mistake converting one system to another, the financial risk is unacceptable and they may as well send me documents in a foreign language.

    Its all about the money...
    Last edited by Keith Outten; 02-08-2018 at 11:21 AM.

  4. #79
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    Keith, it is all about the money.

    That said, when the automotive industry, and many others are already metric, you're lucky to be able to afford to refuse their business.

    We'll all eventually be working in metric..............Regards, Rod.

  5. #80
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    Quote Originally Posted by andrew whicker View Post
    Fractions do suck. I have a 12" engineer ruler that spaces each inch with 10 spaces. That's a quick way around the metric problem, sort of. You would really need an inch divided into 20 spaces to get the precision you may want. (1/16" = .064" & 1 mm = .039")
    I try to always buy rulers with fractions on one side and decimals on the other. It is easy to flip it over to get the scale that I want. It's easier to use the decimal side when I am comparing with the caliper, but other times fractions are easier.
    Steve

  6. #81
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    Quote Originally Posted by Grant Wilkinson View Post
    I use both (or either), depending on what I am doing.

    In Canada, we say that we "went metric" many years ago, but in reality, we just added metric to our long in use imperial system. We by 2 x 4 lumber and space them on 16" centers. We buy 4 x 8 sheets of plywood. But, we buy gas in litres and cold meat in grams. We measure temperature in Celsius, but we don't measure pressure in millibars. We use kilopascals, which are neither metric nor imperial. When asked our height and weight, most of us still say 6' and 175lbs. Ask any woman how much weight she wants to lose and it will always be 5 lbs, not 2.5 kilos.

    In short, I don't believe we really converted at all. Maybe in another generation, it will happen, but it won't be in my life time.
    Grant, isn't the Pascal the unit of pressure in the SI system? ( One Newton per square metre).

    My children have absolutely no idea what units in the Imperial system are, they were born in the 80's and we were metric by then. My drivers license gives my height in cm and my medical records are metric. My van has a fuel consumption rating in litres per 100 Km, as does my motorcycle.

    You're correct that the younger generation will be metric, it's you and I who use both systems.

    My oldest daughter borrowed my BMW bike one day and remarked that her speed was 40 in a school zone and she was passing everyone. She hadn't a clue that the speedometer was in miles per hour

    regards, Rod.

  7. #82
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    I get a laugh every time I hear "should I switch to metric". Not about the person saying it or even whether it's a good thing to do or not. I was in High School during the mid 70's and at that time we were taught the metric system because "the Untited States was going to switching over to the metric system very soon."

    Yeah, that happened.... LOL
    "I've cut the dang thing three times and it's STILL too darn short"
    Name withheld to protect the guilty

    Stew Hagerty

  8. #83
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    Quote Originally Posted by Stew Hagerty View Post
    I get a laugh every time I hear "should I switch to metric". Not about the person saying it or even whether it's a good thing to do or not. I was in High School during the mid 70's and at that time we were taught the metric system because "the Untited States was going to switching over to the metric system very soon."

    Yeah, that happened.... LOL
    I was only in grade school, but remember that. They made a half-hearted attempt to teach us metric units. After school I went to my parents lumberyard until closing time and weighed out nails by the pound, shook gallon and quart paint cans, and loaded 2x4s for customers.

    I'm certain we won't "all eventually be working in metric". Many of us won't live that long. I know I won't.

  9. #84
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    Quote Originally Posted by Grant Wilkinson View Post
    I use both (or either), depending on what I am doing.

    In Canada, we say that we "went metric" many years ago, but in reality, we just added metric to our long in use imperial system. When asked our height and weight, most of us still say 6' and 175lbs.
    Actually most of us used to say 6' and 175 lbs, now we have to admit we are actually 5' 11" and 200 lbs. and who out there has the nerve to ask a women anything about her weight?

  10. #85
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    Here's what happens when you order breakfast with the metric system.

    https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/08/sport...rnd/index.html

  11. #86
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ole Anderson View Post
    Then there is the guy who gets xxx liters/km for "mileage". Hey a mile is 5280 feet.
    Yeah, somehow kilometerage doesn't roll off the tongue as easily as mileage, I guess we should be saying fuel consumption but again mileage seems easier. Actually the measurement is xx litres/100km. Anyone using xxx litres/km would have to be driving a tank. (100 liters/km = .0235 mpg).
    Last edited by Doug Garson; 02-08-2018 at 12:56 PM.

  12. #87
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ted Derryberry View Post
    Here's what happens when you order breakfast with the metric system.

    https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/08/sport...rnd/index.html
    that was funny...................Nothing to do with metric however it sure was a good one.

    I had the same thing happen at work, ordered 12 lengths of cable tray, supplier shipped 12 bundles............Rod.

  13. #88
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    I agree with Patrick about the hardest thing being visualizing just how big the measurements are. Of course if one grows up thinking in metric then it is no problem at all. My problem is that everytime someone says 50mm, I think, oh, that is about 2 inches.

    It seems to me that there is too big of a gap in units. We go from a millimeter to a meter. That is 1000 times larger than the smallest unit. Yes, I know about cm, but how often do we actually see those used?

    The real problem though is money. Like most people I have a shop full of tools based upon the imperial system. I am not going to just fork over all those bucks to do a conversion.

    Oh, one other gripe. Wrench sizes. I need a 17mm wrench like I need a hole in the head. As I look at my wrenches hanging on the wall, how come it takes quite a few more wrenches to cover the same basic size range? Not only that, I can look at a nut and pretty much see that it is a 3/8, not a 5/16 nor a 7/16. Why? because they are about 1.6mm different in size. Of course in metric, that difference is only 1mm. Much more difficult to suss out at a glance.

    Then we end up with when things need to be a wee bit larger or smaller, like for clearances. There we go, we now have measurements like 22.13 mm to get about .005 in of clearance. I guess I will have to start thinking, oh, clearance? Ok, that is a wee bit more than a mm.

    Then there is the really, really big gripe! All those little lines with no small markers to define divisions. Those lines are about 30% closer than 1/16th divisions. Harder to see and work with.

    I think metric is a good idea, and since it is based on a purely arbitrary standard I think those scientists could have picked something that worked for small measurements as well as big honking ones.

    Here is a funny. Watch some of the old Star Treks. They are constantly talking about tracking some vessel that is 500,000km away and shooting at it. Clearly those film folks did NOT have a grip on just how far 500,000 km really is.

    BTW, when I was in 8th grade almost 60 years ago they were telling us that we would be converted completely to metric within a decade or so. Shows you what they knew, huh?

  14. #89
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ted Reischl View Post
    I agree with Patrick about the hardest thing being visualizing just how big the measurements are. Of course if one grows up thinking in metric then it is no problem at all. My problem is that everytime someone says 50mm, I think, oh, that is about 2 inches.

    It seems to me that there is too big of a gap in units. We go from a millimeter to a meter. That is 1000 times larger than the smallest unit. Yes, I know about cm, but how often do we actually see those used?

    The real problem though is money. Like most people I have a shop full of tools based upon the imperial system. I am not going to just fork over all those bucks to do a conversion.

    Oh, one other gripe. Wrench sizes. I need a 17mm wrench like I need a hole in the head. As I look at my wrenches hanging on the wall, how come it takes quite a few more wrenches to cover the same basic size range? Not only that, I can look at a nut and pretty much see that it is a 3/8, not a 5/16 nor a 7/16. Why? because they are about 1.6mm different in size. Of course in metric, that difference is only 1mm. Much more difficult to suss out at a glance.

    Then we end up with when things need to be a wee bit larger or smaller, like for clearances. There we go, we now have measurements like 22.13 mm to get about .005 in of clearance. I guess I will have to start thinking, oh, clearance? Ok, that is a wee bit more than a mm.

    Then there is the really, really big gripe! All those little lines with no small markers to define divisions. Those lines are about 30% closer than 1/16th divisions. Harder to see and work with.

    I think metric is a good idea, and since it is based on a purely arbitrary standard I think those scientists could have picked something that worked for small measurements as well as big honking ones.

    Here is a funny. Watch some of the old Star Treks. They are constantly talking about tracking some vessel that is 500,000km away and shooting at it. Clearly those film folks did NOT have a grip on just how far 500,000 km really is.

    BTW, when I was in 8th grade almost 60 years ago they were telling us that we would be converted completely to metric within a decade or so. Shows you what they knew, huh?
    Hi Ted, your problem with the metric system is that you haven't put the same effort into learning it than you did with the Imperial system. I'm not criticizing you, it's just that people over estimate how much they understand either system. Most people wouldn't know what the Imperial unit of mass is, and most people won't know what the metric unit of weight is, doesn't mean we don't function in those systems in some sort of manner.

    You want 0.005" clearance, did you notice that you picked a nice round number? You didn't pick 0.0043" because you wanted something simple.

    In metric you would pick 0.1mm since it's simple, not 0.13mm.

    Most of the things you like about the Imperial system are completely arbitrary, we use 3/4" thick material because it's more convenient than 49/64", likewise in metric we would pick 20mm rather than 19.35mm.

    As to 1mm being too small, I normally use fractions down to 1/64" (standard markings on a square or 4R rule), so using mm or 0.5mm seems very familiar.

    When making a 3/4" thick piece of wood you might add 1/32" or 1/64" to allow for sanding, in metric you would add 0.5mm sanding allowance.

    It's all the same, you put a lot of effort into learning a system, the other system is just as good, in fact better in some cases........regards, Rod.
    Last edited by Rod Sheridan; 02-08-2018 at 1:49 PM.

  15. #90
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    I considered that quite a few years ago like ~ 30-40, when the metric mania tried to take over, but couldn't justify the transition. Having a Machinist, Tool & Die Maker and Mfg. Engineering background I had memorized the decimal equivalent of fractions, dealt with decimals to 3-4 places, and also found/find myself multiplying the number of mm by 0.03937 to get the decimal equivalent. It just never worked for me.

    Unfortunately, I can't shake this and still end up working to finer tolerances than is really required for woodworking. Oh well.
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