06-11-2011, 11:28 PM
doctorwayne Wrote:Metric makes sense mathematically, but in many instances the increments are either too large (temperature) and therefore less accurate, too small (mm cm) - awkward when referring to lumber - a 2"x4" (actually 1.5"x3.5") becomes a 38x89, or (km) - bordering on the ridiculous for a country as large as Canada. Measuring gasoline in litres is just another ploy to disguise the price increases
Just a mater of what you are used to. Precision is pretty much the same, utility is pretty much the same.
Temperatures e.g. - we routinely give them with one digit after the decimal point when we want/need more precision - say 38.4C for a slightly elevated body temperature. Increments of 0.1C are accurate enough for most everyday uses - the difference between 100F and 101F is about 0.6C, and it doesn't much matter if you say "hundred and one" or "thirty-eight four" :-)
Road distances - doesn't matter much if you give them in (English) miles or kilometers, or as we do - in daily life we give driving distances as Norwegian miles (one Norwegian mile = 10 kilometers). So you can give a distance of 800 kilometers as 80 Norwegian miles or as about 500 English miles. Same difference - it is about as far as you can drive in 10 hours at about 80 kph/50 mph :-)
Lumber - doesn't really matter if you call em 2x4 or 38x89 - it is the same size. Lengths can be in feet, or in meters - a 2.4 meter long board is about 8 feet long.
Imperial or metric work out about the same in terms of precision and utility. Main difference is that metric is a little easier to use for some calculations, since conversion between different units mainly consists of moving the decimal point. 2.4 meters = 24 decimeters = 240 centimeters = 2400 millimeters. 2.4 liter equals 24 deciliters = 240 centiliters = 2400 milliliters. As opposed to multiplying or dividing by 12 or 16 or whatever when you go from one measure to another.
But it pretty much boils down to whatever you are used to.
Anyways - thank you for the measurement pictures of the Hayes bumper!
Smile,
Stein