What do you think?  I'm genuinely curious.

Edited September 24, 20205 yr by arwasairl

Depends what for..  I prefer metric for tools, nuts & bolts after having owned several Japanese motorcycles and British cars which were not old enough to be using Imperial fasteners.

However for aviation units I am more used to feet and mph or knots. Never have got used to Russian altimeters reading in metres.. 

Speaking as a Canadian:

• for aviation - the usual combination of metric and Imperial (height in feet, distance in nautical miles, fuel weight in kilograms, air pressure in InHg, etc.)
• for everything else - metric

53 minutes ago, JRMurray said:

Speaking as a Canadian:

• for aviation - the usual combination of metric and Imperial (height in feet, distance in nautical miles, fuel weight in kilograms, air pressure in InHg, etc.)
• for everything else - metric

As is the case in Australia, disappointed that for flight planning you can only choose between Gals or Lbs for weight but the A320 shows Kg in the MCD. I'm starting to wonder what logic Asobo had with this. At least the altimeter in some aircraft can be changed to Hg.

Edited September 24, 20205 yr by JustanotherPilot

2 hours ago, HighBypass said:

Depends what for..  I prefer metric for tools, nuts & bolts after having owned several Japanese motorcycles and British cars which were not old enough to be using Imperial fasteners.

However for aviation units I am more used to feet and mph or knots. Never have got used to Russian altimeters reading in metres.. 

Must be a British thing. Completely agree with this.

I suspect most people in the UK, would probably say, if someone stopped for directions: 'It's about two and a half miles up the road' rather than 'It's approximately four kilometres up the road'.

It's the same with smaller distances too, if someone said a house was about 50 feet tall, I suspect everyone would have a pretty good understanding of what to picture, whereas I think some would struggle to get a good mental picture if you said the house was 15.25 metres tall. And in spite of EU shopping regulations, nobody in the UK goes to buy 0.9 kg of sugar, it's a bag of sugar (which everyone knows weighs two pounds), and nobody buys 2.25 kg of potatoes either, it's a five pound bag of spuds. 

I'm okay with either system as far as understanding them goes, but personally I'd use and prefer imperial when chatting with people about distances, weights, speeds and altitudes, however, when I make models and stuff like that, I always use metric because it is simpler to work out scale stuff from a decimal system where everything is multiples of ten, so it's obvious that metric is better for engineering and such, but the colloquial understanding of what a mile or six feet is and what a bag of sugar feels like when you pick it up, will mean that Imperial stuff is likely to be with us for years.

I speak both and work with both as I have worked in Canada, USA and now New Zealand in my lifetime. I prefer imperial and as soon as you memorize decimal inches it makes it that much easier. 

As for the USA and 'Freedom Units' I laugh every time I hear that. The USA is a Metric Industrialized Nation but you are free to use Imperial in your day to day life, however when the US Armed forces defends the Nation the are using Metric, when NASA fires rockets into space they are officially using Metric (but sometimes missions are using both in operations), when you fly in a Boeing they are built using Metric, when you drive a Ford they are built using Metric, when you use your Apple Gadget they are built using Metric, everything in the USA is pretty much manufactured in Metric with the exception for when you cook your food the oven is imperial and when you add an addition to your house you measure in feet and inches, you are free to use Imperial Units but really the US industry is as Metric as anywhere else.

It is when things become hybrid it becomes confusing, for example a Boeing built in Metric is operated in Imperial Units by a US Carrier, many examples of this which is why it is beneficial to know both.

Edited September 24, 20205 yr by Matthew Kane

40 minutes ago, Matthew Kane said:

It is when things become hybrid it becomes confusing, for example a Boeing built in Metric is operated in Imperial Units by a US Carrier, many examples of this which is why it is beneficial to know both.

Nah, Boeing is 100% Imperial. All measurements are in inches from the datum, all fasteners are SAE and all torques are in inch pounds. The metric equivalents come in 2nd.

14 minutes ago, Garys said:

Nah, Boeing is 100% Imperial. All measurements are in inches from the datum, all fasteners are SAE and all torques are in inch pounds. The metric equivalents come in 2nd.

Wow just checked yes they are Imperial, I never worked for Boeing directly but I did work for Goodrich (now UTC Aerospace Systems) that supplied landing gear to Boeing, we used Metric in that operation. At the end of the day Boeing for the most part are assemblers using numerous suppliers

Edited September 24, 20205 yr by Matthew Kane

While I'm metric guy, in aviation, the feet altitude really make sence so far.

The main issue is the vertical spreation is based on 1000 feet, so it's much easir to tell what altitude you should be above a guy flying at 11000feet, that's 12000feet, easy. Rather than how high you should be when the other one is at 3300 meter, you need to +300 to get 3600, while that seems easy, image now 600 or 900meter above, and you are doing math when flying above 300kts, or controlling dozen of aircrafts on your monitor...(That's exactly what we are doing now in China then....)

The only time I feel the metric make more sence in aviation alittude/height, is when calculation gradient, m/m or m/km makes it much easier tha feet/mile or feet/nm....it's just why the hake imperial didn't use things like kilofeet or so.....

 

But who knows, with better systems, maybe one day we will fly at 100meter interval, that will make metric flight altitude make sence... but of course there will be inertia from change then.. I'd expect 500' be the next we use then...

I've still got a box full of BSW spanners, BSF & BSW taps and dies,  I know I will never use them again, but I just dont have the will to throw them away. A/F and Metric spanners are the best thing since sliced bread.

In regard to temperature all of the British tabloids loves using Fahrenheit for heatwaves but Celsius for “Arctic Blasts” as they so amusingly describe cold weather.

90F sounds a lot hotter than 32C but “Minus 10 Celsius” sounds a lot worse than 14F. 🤣

When Concorde was built by British and French engineers the French measured everything in metric and the Brits used imperial. Recipe for disaster you would imagine but amazingly it worked perfectly!

I imagine they did the same with the Channel Tunnel. The two tunnels were only a few inches out I believe. Vive la difference! 😁

16 hours ago, Chock said:

Must be a British thing. Completely agree with this.

I suspect most people in the UK, would probably say, if someone stopped for directions: 'It's about two and a half miles up the road' rather than 'It's approximately four kilometres up the road'.

 

 

Yep, definitely a British thing. We use both in the UK, Metric and Imperial. For me, if I want accuracy I go for metric but for course measurements I use imperial. 

Most definitely we would we say "two and a half miles up the road". Our cars are in miles per hour, with very small lettering for kilometres. And our speed limit signs are in miles per hour. Come to think of it, our sat navs give us miler rather than kilometres and MPH. 

On the other hand, nip down to B&Q for some wood or some chip board and it will be in metric. 😁

 

Edited September 25, 20205 yr by martin-w

I thought it only happened here, that you were able to buy a meter of 3" tube 😝

18 hours ago, Chock said:

and nobody buys 2.25 kg of potatoes either, it's a five pound bag of spuds. 

Nobody does buy 2.25 kg of potatoes in metric land either. It's 1.5 kg or 2. 😉