Bring back obsolete measures consultation

[Highland Mule]

So you have never seen a drawing with a tolerance of +or - .0002”

Nothing in imperial except historic drawings. Which contemporary design standard would you be producing to if using inches?

 

[thesilentone]

If we're going to go back, let's do it properly.

AcreUnit of area, equal to 4840 square yards. Still very much in use.

BagObscure unit of volume, equal to 24 gallons.

BarleycornUnit of length. Three to the inch. A very old measure, not used for centuries.

Barrel (beer)Unit of volume, equal to 36 gallons, or 4 firkins. Still in use.

Barrel (wine)Unit of volume, equal to 31.5 gallons. No longer in use

Barrel (oil)A US measure, not English. Equals 42 US gallons.

British Thermal Unit, or Btu.Unit of energy or work

BucketObscure unit of volume, equal to 4 gallons.

BushelUnit of volume, equal to 8 gallons, or 4 pecks. Not in use much at all these days, but beware that the US bushel is different.

ButtUnit of volume, usually for wine or beer. Can be 108 or 126 gallons, depending. No longer used.

CableUnit of length, at sea. Defined as 1 tenth of a nautical mile.

ChainUnit of length, equal to 22 yards, which is the length of a cricket pitch. When I was at school, we were given such chains to measure things with - each chain made up of 100 links. There are 10 chains to the furlong. Not seen much these days, but still seen on not-so-old maps etc.

CloveObscure unit of weight, equal to 7 pounds (av.)

Drachm (fluid)Unit of volume, equal to 60 minims. 8 fluid drachms to the fluid ounce.

Dram [also spelled as Drachm] (avoirdupois)Unit of weight. 16 drams to the (av.) ounce.

Dram [also spelled as Drachm] (troy)Unit of weight. Equal to 60 grains. 8 drams to the (troy) ounce.

EllUnit of length. Very, very old. The English ell should be taken as 45 inches, or a yard and a quarter, and the Scots ell is 37 Scots inches, or 72.2 English inches. Very much not used.

FathomUnit of length, or rather depth, equal to 6 feet. Still encountered.

FirkinUnit of volume, especially beer. Equals 9 gallons. Extremely popular in pub names!

FootUnit of length. 12 inches, 3 feet to the yard. Very, very common.

FurlongUnit of length, equal to 220 yards, or 10 chains. There are 8 furlongs to the mile. The name seems to derive from the length of a furrow, somehow. This unit is still used, especially so in horse-racing.

GallonUnit of volume. Equal to 8 pints. The Imperial gallon was defined in the act of 1824 as the volume of 10lb of water at 62°F. Before this, the gallon was redefined over the years (especially around the time of the American revolution) with consequent problems for our colonial cousins, which is why we have 8 of our gallons to one of our bushels, but the Americans have 9.309177 of their gallons (or 7.751512 of ours) to one of their bushels. To get around this, they have a dry gallon and a liquid gallon, which are different. To summarise:

Imperial gallon	277.4194 cubic inches
US dry gallon	268.8025 cubic inches
US liquid gallon	231 cubic inches

GillUnit of volume. Normally taken as a quarter of a pint, it can also be a third or a half pint, especially in conversation. The legal definition is a 1/4 of a pint. The word Gill is pronouced with a hard G (as Jill).

GrainThe basic unit of weight in the imperial system. There are 5760 grains to the Troy pound, and 7000 to the avoirdupois pound.

HandUnit of length, or normally height, equal to 4 inches. Still (almost) universally used in England to measure horses.

HogsheadUnit of volume (wine only). 52.5 gallons. Until 1824 it was 63 gallons, a figure still used by the Americans.

Horsepower (common)A unit of power. Equal to 33000 foot-pound-force per minute. Very much in use today.

Horsepower (RAC)A strange unit, used only to tax cars in the first decades to the 20th century. It was based on the cylinder diameter, not the swept volume or power, which seems to have inspired W O Bentley at least to design long-stroke engines to get them into a lower taxation class.

Horsepower (misc.)There are all sorts of other horsepowers (boiler, metric, electric, metric etc.) - beware!

HundredweightUnit of weight, equal to 8 stones. 20 hundredweight to a ton. This unit is commonly abbreviated to 'cwt'.

Hundredweight (short)Unit of weight, not much used in England, but apparently used still in the US. Equals 100 pounds, 20 to the Short ton.

InchVery basic unit of length. 12 to the foot. Very much in use.

KilderkinObscure unit of volume, equal to 18 gallons.

KipObscure unit of force - equal to 1000 pound-force.

KnotUnit of speed or velocity, equal to 1 nautical mile per hour. Universally used to control the speed of ships and aircraft.

LastVery obscure unit of volume - equal to 640 gallons.

LeagueUnit of length. Equal to 3 miles, so a league at sea is different to a league on land. Much used by poets, but nobody else.

LbThe abbreviation used for 'pound'. It comes from the Latin word Libra which translates to 'pound'. This is where the fancy 'L' comes from when talking about the pound sterling (i.e. the unit of currency in the UK).

LineUnit of length. Some authorities (generally American) say 10 lines to the inch, and some say 12. This seems to be a printing term.

LinkUnit of length, there being 100 links to a chain. Virtually never seen these days.

MilUnit of length. Shown as 1/1000 of an inch in some books, I have never known anyone use this in England, as a millimetre (an obscure French measure) is known colloquially as a 'mill'. See thou. However, many friends from across the Atlantic have pointed out that the mill is very much in use in the US, for measuring paper, plastic (rubbish bags/garbage sacks etc.) and wire.

Mile (statute)Unit of length, equal to 1760 yards, or 8 furlongs. This unit is universal in England for measuring distances between places etc., and is always used on road-signs (eg LONDON 180 miles) and speedometers (as in miles per hour), and consequently is always quoted by drivers when talking about fuel consumption (as in miles per gallon).

Mile (nautical)Unit of length, normally at sea or in the air. Originally, the Admiralty fixed it at 6080 feet. This unit is universally used by international law by ships and aircraft, as is the derived unit of the knot.
In the 20th century, an international nautical mile was defined as 1852 metres, and so you will sometimes see the 6080ft nautical mile called the British nautical mile.

MinimUnit of volume. 60 minims to the fluid ounce.

NailObscure unit of length, equal to 2 and a quarter inches.

NogginUnit of volume - maybe a colloquism. Same as the gill. This word is quite often used in pubs etc. in certain parts of England, but not in a technical sense!

Ounce - avoirdupoisUnit of weigh, equal to 437.5 grains. 16 drams to the ounce, 16 ounces to the pound. This unit is still very much used in England.

Ounce - fluidUnit of volume, equal to 8 fluid drachms. 20 fluid ounces = 1 pint. This unit is still used, especially in recipes.

Ounce - troyUnit of weight, equal to 480 grains, or 24 scruples. or 20 pennyweights or 8 drams. 12 ounces to the pound.Used for weighing bullion, and as an apocatheries measure.

PaceObscure unit of length. Equal to 2.5 feet.

PalmObscure unit of length. Equal to 3 inches.

PeckUnit of volume, equal to 2 gallons. Not much in use these days.

PennyweightUnit of weight, equal to 24 grains. There are 20 to the Troy ounce.

PerchOld unit of length - same as rod and pole. 16.5 feet.

PintUnit of volume. The universal measure for beer. There are 20 fluid ounces to the pint, and 8 pints to the gallon. Different to US pints - beware!

PoleOld unit of length - same as rod and perch. 16.5 feet.

Pound - avoirdupoisUnit of weight, equal to 7000 grains, or 16 avoirdupois ounces. 14 pounds = 1 stone. This unit is still very much used in England.

Pound - troyUnit of weight, equal to 5760 grains, or 12 troy ounces. Used for weighing bullion, and as an apocatheries measure. The troy pound was outlawed in 1878.

PoundalUnit of force. There are 32.174 to the pound-force (acceleration to to gravity being 32.174 feet per second per second).

Pound-forceUnit of force.

PSIUnit of pressure - an abbreviation for pounds per square inch.

PuncheonObscure unit of volume - equal to 70 gallons.

QuartUnit of volume, equal to 2 pints. 4 quarts = 1 gallon. The use of this unit has declined sharply over the last 20 years.

QuarterUnit of weight, equal to 2 stones. 4 quarters = 1 hundredweight. General use of this unit seems to have died out around the time of WWII.

QuarterUnit of volume, equal to 64 gallons.

RodUnit of length; It is 16.5 feet, which is strange even by English standards. It is better to define it in terms of the rood.

RopeObscure unit of length - equal to 20 feet.

RoodUnit of area; an area of 1 furlong long by 1 rod wide, or 1210 square yards. There are 4 roods to the acre.

RopeObscure unit of length - equal to 20 feet.

SackObscure unit of weight, equal to 26 stones.

ScrupleUnit of weight. Equals 20 grains. 3 to the Troy dram.

Scruple (fluid).Unit of volume. Equals 20 minims.

SeamObscure unit of volume, equal to 64 gallons.

SlugStrange unit of weight - equal to 32.174 pounds (av.) - see poundal.

SpanObscure unit of length - equal to 9 inches.

StoneUnit of weight, equal to 14 pounds (av.). Often used in England for weighing people. 8 stones = 1 hundredweight. Still quite common in England, although its use seems to be declining.

ThouAn unofficial unit of length - one thousandth of an inch.

TodAn obscure unit of weight - same as the quarter.

TonUnit of weight, sometimes (especially in the US) known as a long ton. Equals 20 hundredweight, or 2240 pounds. Still very much in use.

Ton (register).Unit of capacity - for measuring ships. 100 cubic feet.

Ton (short).Unit of weight, especially in the US. Equals 2000 pounds, and therefore 20 'short' hundredweight.

YardFundamental unit of length. 36 inches (or 3 feet) to the yard, 1760 yards to the statute mile.

Yard (of ale)This is a drinking glass about 3 feet long, hence the name. It has a wide mouth, which narrows towards the closed end, where it terminates in a bulb. It is not easy to drink from! It holds about 2 pints.

 

[HatsOff]

The current system works very well. Use whatever you damn well please but if involving someone else, use metric equivalent for consistency and fairness.

 

[Wood field]

Nothing in imperial except historic drawings. Which contemporary design standard would you be producing to if using inches?

My brain won’t go back far enough to start quoting iso numbers .. suffice to say I can assure you as an apprentice in the 80’s we worked to drawings with tolerance’s measured in thousandths , the advent of cnc machining, cad design etc will I admit have replaced/ negated the old ways .
Back on topic, I would think most of us of a certain age will have been taught both measuring systems and adapt to what we are comfortable with, I measure distance on the farm in meters ie fence lines, but feed in kilograms, mix lambs milk replacement in grams, and drive 7 miles to the garage for x amount of litres of diesel as my pickup only does 25 mpg

 

[Cowabunga]

How many miles to the gallon does your car do ?

Isn’t it totally ridiculous that we still measure distance in miles! All this conversion for working out fuel consumption could be avoided if kilometres were used and the litres per 100kms is so much more logical than mpg where better economy is expressed as a rising figure of distance rather than the more sensible metric method of lowering volume of fuel over a set distance.

 

[Highland Mule]

My brain won’t go back far enough to start quoting iso numbers .. suffice to say I can assure you as an apprentice in the 80’s we worked to drawings with tolerance’s measured in thousandths , the advent of cnc machining, cad design etc will I admit have replaced/ negated the old ways .
Back on topic, I would think most of us of a certain age will have been taught both measuring systems and adapt to what we are comfortable with, I measure distance on the farm in meters ie fence lines, but feed in kilograms, mix lambs milk replacement in grams, and drive 7 miles to the garage for x amount of litres of diesel as my pickup only does 25 mpg

Here's a shock for you - the 80s were 40-odd years ago. I would be very surprised if any ISO standards use inches any more.

 

[Wuffler]

"thou" is still the most commonly used term in precision engineering though.

You're right if it's like any of the precision engineers I know.
"Thou shalt not come within ten feet of me whilst I'm working, now f@ck off"...

 

[Mark Hatton]

Im just waiting for someone to proclaim this is a Brexit benefit!!!

 

[Highland Mule]

Isn’t it totally ridiculous that we still measure distance in miles! All this conversion for working out fuel consumption could be avoided if kilometres were used and the litres per 100kms is so much more logical than mpg where better economy is expressed as a rising figure of distance rather than the more sensible metric method of lowering volume of fuel over a set distance.

Funny, but mpg is one of the few I still use. I don't like the 'l/100km' measure as I feel it doesn't have as obvious a difference between good and bad.

Im just waiting for someone to proclaim this is a Brexit benefit!!!

JRM has, on multiple occassions.

 

[Mark Hatton]

Funny, but mpg is one of the few I still use. I don't like the 'l/100km' measure as I feel it doesn't have as obvious a difference between good and bad.



JRM has, on multiple occassions.

I gave up listening to that prat a long time ago, if thats all he can come up with we really are in a bigger mess than anyone in government will ever admit too.

 

[Wood field]

Here's a shock for you - the 80s were 40-odd years ago. I would be very surprised if any ISO standards use inches any more.

I am fully aware of when it was , those of us who trained in them times will still often refer to thousandths , another thing modern “ engineers” seem to have a beef with is those of us whe served an old fashioned apprenticeship of 4 plus years with the obligatory college release night schools calling ourselves engineer because we didn’t go to uni, I “only “ did my HND as I preferred to be on the tools , my brother much later in life did his degree and said to my daughter,
I am the engineer your dads “just a craftsman “
My daughter at 15 yrs old replied, no uncle Bob, your a pen pusher my dads the engineer “
But we could argue this one all day long , suffice to say the proposal in the op are frankly ridiculous!

 

[Courier]

Keep miles.

Keep pints of beer.

I work in inches in the workshop, it is easier to half things - half 4 and 7/8 is exactly 2 and 7/16 for example.

Base 12 has a lot to recommend it - hours in a day was sorted out thousands of years ago.

And half 20 is 10

 

[roscoe erf]

Great idea when the whole workforce up to the age of about 60 has been educated in the metric system

And still use feet and inches

 

[Courier]

I am fully aware of when it was , those of us who trained in them times will still often refer to thousandths ……!

Strange how “old fashioned” thousandths are arrived at by multiplying 10 x 10 x 10

 

[Wood field]

Strange how “old fashioned” thousandths are arrived at by multiplying 10 x 10 x 10

Maybe we should go back to it then

 

[Derrick Hughes]

You sell seed in kilos though?

By the acre I sell

 

[Mark Hatton]

Occasionally help a joiner mate of mine, he works mostly in metric, but occasionally he'll shout out the odd imperial measurement to check you are listening!

 

[honeyend]

We filled it scathingly in, not worthy of a school project, and wrote to our MP and got a codswallop reply.
Its dangerous to mix measurements, and in medicine just adding 0 can kill you. Mistaking 70mph and 60kph in court, but not to worry we do not have to go on the ferry and drive in the EU on a whim anymore.
Just think of the cost of recalibrating machines if they are being imported from or to the metric market. You get discount for volume and most medical equipment and supplies is made for the metric market, but heigh ho we can just spend more money on getting wee bags and IV bags in pints, so we can be different.
Its a dead cat to satisfy the people who wish that the UK can ever be like the sunlight uplands of the 1970's. What ever £1 you are paying with, its worth is diminishing.

 

[Courier]

Maybe we should go back to it then

Should really have been in 1024 ths - but then again maybe it wasn’t meant to be as accurate

 

[Wood field]

Should really have been in 1024 ths - but then again maybe it wasn’t meant to be as accurate

We wouldn’t be able to pick up the feeler gauges