US switching to metric system?

[Clev]

Originally Posted by womprat

I've always found it slightly ironic that USA clings to the British system (modified a little), yet I live in a British Commonwealth member nation and we made the switch to metric without flinching. The difference being New Zealand is a young nation, things are easy to administrate - we have about the size and population of a single US state.

I find it slightly more ironic that Britain still clings to the British system. :-)

[Piwoslaw]

Originally Posted by Clev

I find it slightly more ironic that Britain still clings to the British system. :-)

Are we back to the 'Pint of ale' discussion?

[jkp1187]

XKCD did a guide to converting to metric here:

xkcd - A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language - By Randall Munroe

(Slightly off-color humor, but I think he's right in that to successfully convert to Metric, Americans need to 'think in Metric,' not just try to convert on-the-fly.)

On the subject, I was amused (confused?) to learn, when I weighed myself on a scale at the exercise room in a London hotel last year, that I weighed 11.5 "stone"....

[luvit]

actually U.K. uses kiliometers and miles, meters and feet, quite equally.
--so it's not just a U.S. mind set.

but they probably use celcius 100% of the time.

[gone-ot]

...uh, "inch-pounds" got Americans safely to and back from the Moon, not "metrics."

...and, 13mm ~ ½" socket/wrench.

[Bicycle Bob]

A missed metric conversion killed a recent Mars landing.
The conversion that bothers me more than any other is the U.S. gallon. It made some sharpers a few bucks when first introduced, and cost millions of man-hours among everyone else since.

[Clev]

Originally Posted by Piwoslaw

Are we back to the 'Pint of ale' discussion?

No, miles and mph on British roadways.

[gone-ot]

...at least it's "miles" and not "furlongs" per fortnights!

[ShadeTreeMech]

I know when using a standard tape measure I wish I had a metric one. Having to closely peer at a bunch of tiny lines and guessing if they are 1/4, 1/8, 1/16 or 1/32 is annoying. But when I had a metric tape measure, it was easy as pie.

And wouldn't it be cooler to say "my 0-100 time is 7 seconds" rather than "my 0-60 time..."

The Bugatti Veyron can do 404 kph sounds awesome compared to 240 mph.

[Piwoslaw]

Originally Posted by ShadeTreeMech

The Bugatti Veyron can do 404 kph sounds awesome compared to 240 mph.

But doesn't the Veyron's 1001 horsepower sound better than 746 kW?

BTW, I can send you a metric tape measure. 3m? 5m?