I have noticed that most of the time people reference units in Miles Per Hour, Feet and inches. I was told when I was in highschool, back in the 70's that the USA was the only country that was backward and used no SI units for measurment. Here it is 31 years after I graduated from highschool and I hang out on this UK web site and I find a lot of measurements in the "old fashioned" units.
What is going on here.

Well, y'see, we Brits like to think we're keeping up with the rest of the 'progressive' world by adopting the metric system (incidentlly, the changeover happened in the year of my birth, 1971), but we are such an atavistic bunch and so uttelry scared of 'new' things and change that we have (a) fought the introduction of the metric system tooth & nail and (b) made such a half-assed god-awful balls up of introducing it we stioll aren't sure what we're meant to be doing.
So, you can still buy beer & milk in pints whilst spirits are sold in centilitres, mad!

It's in the hands of the politicians, so it'll always be a half-assed situation until someone finally makes a decision. Making metric compulsory is a guaranteed vote-loser in this country - despite the fact that kids have been taught nothing else for 30 years or so.
Shame really - I'd cheerfully go 100% metric tomorrow (I use it most of the time anyway).

Mind you, I've been surprised by some of the old boys in my local pub, cheerfully talking about planting 5 metre rows of runner beans!

rgds,

David

neither of my kids (16 and 18) were taught 'imperial' units at school - it was all metric.

I generally for engineering use, use metric, cos the units all inter-relate to each other in a convenient way and dont express things in silly increments of 1/64ths and the like.

In general life in the UK, the situation is mixed.

By law, if you buy loose product, it MUST be sold in metric, but it can also be optionally sold in imperial units. So, if you want to buy meat slices in ounces, you can. However, there are several attention seeking idiots who 'champion' the cause against metrication by refusing to upgrade their scales to do both units. So they get on TV claiming to be heros against european meddling, when all they needed to do was to update their 20 year old scales, and still allow ordering by 'old' units.

We tend to have a mixed system.


Weather temperatures are in degrees C

milk and beer are sold in pints.


However, whisky is sold in metric shots.

petrol is sold in litres, but we insist on talking about the price in gallons, and how many miles per gallon our car does. However, saying to someone that your car does 30 to the gallon is more understodd than saying, for example, my car does 9.3 litres per 100 kilometres!!!!!!


carpet is sold in square metres.

peoples height are expressed in inches.

body weight is expressed in stones and lbs (ie 144lbs is 10 stone 4lbs)

travelling distance is expressed in miles.

the gradient of a hill is expressed in metric.

so, on a journey you fill your car in metric, drive an imperial distance, up a metric hill.


It makes more sense in reality!


atb

steve

i use which ever is most convenient , its easier with bigger measuremants to say 8 ft than it is to say 2.44M . And its ironic while on my recent trip to rhodes , that buying plywood - it would be in 2.5M lengths , but 4ft wide , purely because the machines they were using were still imperial cutting machines !! ie they were british made from the old era and still going strong . EVEN though , the greeks with being one of the oldest cultures , operate in metric

Try buying coper pipe in france, ......... you get choice of sizes, 1/2", 3/4". (allegedly)



Enjoy. 73 days & counting

I prefer metric when using the computer or calculators. I prefer imperial for sketches and working in the real world. I find it's easier to work with fractions when figuring things out in my head / on paper - there's usually fewer digits to fuss with.

We're mostly metric here but our race parts come from the US, and are usually imperial. What's really confusing is gallons and MPG, it's often hard to tell whether someone means US or imperial. And dollars, is it US or CDN - makes a big difference in price .

the main thing is that we are totally inconsistent (and proud of it!)

i am 6'1", 11 stone, i go x mph, but measure in mm & l, and 100° is the boiling point of water, not a hot summer!




edit:
oh yeah, who will join me in the crusade to keep car things imperial...

POWER = BHP
TORQUE = lb.ft

everyone knows what you're talking about with these - none of this kW / PS and Nm crap, doesn't make any sense!

(having said that, and sticking to the inconsistencies, metric nuts and bolts are fine, and cubic capacity should always be in litres, it's too difficult to work out what a 428 / 545 whatever actually means, tho it does sound cool with reference to mopar v8's...)

[Edited on 10/11/04 by skinny]