Dear Louis,

Your call for attention to the ongoing waste of time and risk of communication errors, caused by the use of the “ archaic American units”, is so right.

In the sixties of the previous age, I had to adapt from the kgf.m.s system to the ISO system, which was not really a big problem as only the definition of mass and force was involved.

And the difference between mass and force is easy to understand (acceleration of gravity), which made the transition smooth.

As for the US units, there is no reason to stick to them.

However, for the manufacturing industry, there are some issues to overcome.

If you want to change to metric, all machines (s.a. lathes) and measuring devices have to be replaced. (Pipe forming is still in inches).

Companies, which are still operating with old equipment (and believe me there are), have double sets of tools (metric and English).

This statement classifies those companies as old fashioned and behind in development.

Your suggestion of “segregating posts which do not have the good manners to use ISO units of measure, or at least metric units”, does not seem fair to the forum members who take the effort to participate in this forum. I would certainly not exclude them.

And if they adapt to the SI system, they would be isolated in their own company or country.

As far as I remember, the change in the UK was forced by law.

Just as in Sweden, where they changed from driving on the left side of the road to the right side of the road. (Imaging what would have happened when this was not enforced by law).

For the meantime, we have to live with the 2 systems being used simultaneously and mixed, which also can be learned (primarily by metric educated engineers).

I incorporated the unit conversion factors for the input variables in my software to prevent mistakes and time loss. The output is in ISO units.

Probably metric tons!

Have a nice day

Teus ■

In this country (Australia), new babies are still measured in pounds and inches but thankfully, I still buy my tomatoes in kilograms and my car displays km/h (rather than furlongs/fornight).

As an engineer educated in the '60s, when using unfamiliar units, I sometimes make a quick mental conversion to ensure the calculated result is reasonable.

I agree, standard pipe sizes can be a nuisance but I am forever grateful we made the change.

Michael Reid. ■

I am a Canadian that grew up learning the Imperial system as that was all that was taught in the schools. While I was working as a young engineering technician in Nova Scotia in the early 1980's, Canada was ordered to go metric thinking that the Americans would not be far behind. This was ordered to improve the exporting of goods outside of Canada.

The cost to retrofit our packaging and bagging machines and other equipment was astronomical but we had to do it. Ours was mild compared to the rest of the country's companies. I think the Americans were quick to see that the cost to switch over to the metric system would be a major blow to the American economy and decided that they could not justify it. At that point Canada seemed to slow down on metrification - yes everything is specified in metric and we drive in Km/Hr now and not Miles /Hr and we measure our temperature in Celsius.

Now here is an example of an area where it is a problem for us. If you are building a house the building code calls for the spacing of the studs in metric and the plywood that would go on those studs is given in a metric measure also. Now when you go to the local lumber yard a sheet of plywood that measures 48" x 96" is there in plenty but try to find a metric sheet of plywood. Why you might ask? Because the cost of a 48" x 96" sheet of plywood is much cheaper than a sheet of metric plywood.

So that builder goes back to his blueprints and his crew and says "set all the studs at 16" on center" instead of what the building code says. Again it comes down to a cost factor.

The ironic thing about the plant that we switched over to metric - 65% of our orders went to the US and they had to be packaged in Imperial. So instead of them getting a 50 pound bag of salt they got a 44 lb (20 KG) bag of salt because our baggers were now set for 20 and 40 KG bags. But they paid the same price in order to offset the cost of metrification.

Yes I agree metric is a much easier system to work in but to change from what is normal to others is not that simple.

And yes Teus I have metric and imperial wrenches in my garage. You have to here. Many American made products in Canada since we are their largest trading partner. ■

I was born in Portugal but immigrated to the USA at age 8. I was educated in the USA in the imperial system. In college we were taught both but the emphasis was on the imperial. Thermodynamics was especially fun try to sort through the two systems. Throughout my career I have done projects in either system and often enough a mixture of the two, as is common for the North American and South American Countries. Korea and the middle east remain somewhat mixed as well, being nearly all metric but 60htz and horsepower on their drives.

Though I know that we all should be on the metric system, I have given up on caring too much and I am happy to work in either system. In my writings I always use metric units but often followed by the imperial units in parenthesis. For my most recent article, based on a study done in imperial units, I found it so cumbersome to make the changes to metric and then match them up with the figures that I just gave up. I made the primary units imperial followed by metric units in parenthesis. I'm not very proud of this.

Joe Dos Santos ■

Though I agree that the metric system is the way to go nothing can protect us from incompetence and carelessness. ■