That state of metric conversion in the US

[rickman]

Because 10/64s is larger than 9/64s. This sort of thing is common for
construction and woodworking. Just forget the denominator and use the
numerator; less to remember.

You have totally lost me on this one. Who was talking about 9/64ths?
The original point was that it may not be hard to turn fractions into
other types of numbers, but converting other measurements into
fractional inches is a PITA. The questions was, what is 4 mm in
fractional inches. I don't get why 10/64ths would be given in place of
5/32. I don't think I even have a measuring device that is marked in
64ths of an inch other than possibly a 6" steel rule that I don't even
know the whereabouts of at the moment.

My point was that metric is just a better way to go, in part because all
the measurements are decimal which is just so much easier to work with
in nearly all situations.

 

[Tim Williams]

Huh? ANSI A,B,... have the short side of A+1 equal to the long side
of A. A-size is 8.5x11, B=11x17, C=17x22, etc.

But they don't have equal aspect ratios.

European is the best but you don't like A4? Someone is tired tonight.
It might be me, though.

I didn't say it was the best shape, I said it was the best mathematically.

Math has a lot of elegant and aesthetic features, but this isn't one of
them

I'm with you on 16:9. I much prefer 16:10 (this one is 1920x1200),
but they're much more expensive. You can have 4:3 *AND* CRTs, long
may they remain cold. *ick* (my monitors at work are 4:3 -
1600x1200)

Besides the overpopulation of 1080 LCDs, I just don't like their color,
slow refresh rate (my Trinitron runs at 85Hz, fast LCDs are special
order), and especially the funky contrast at odd angles -- if you're
trying to do subtle design work with precise colors, you have to sit
perfectly still. If anyone bumps your monitor, you have to spend minutes
scooting it back into just the right position. Not high priority for most
schematic jockeys, but I hold mine to higher standards.

Tim

 

[rickman]

Interestingly the inch was rounded to 25.4mm for easier metric
conversion partly because in the US and the UK they had different
inches. So in a way the inch is already metric.

But it depends on what you are used to. Back in the old days when all
components where specified in inches I mostly used mils when designing
PCBs. It actually took me some time to switch to the metric system for
PCB design

If you are in the US you must be the only one! Every once in a while I
see someone from outside the US in a PCB layout forum talk about board
dimensions in metric and I have to do all the conversions myself. No
one else in these groups uses metric for layer/board thickness or trace
widths. The layout package I use can't even be set for metric trace
widths in spite of the fact that in the data files *all* dimensions are
in nanometers to make conversions easy (its easy to go from inches to
metric exactly, but not the other way so much). Some foreign vendors
expect metric dimensions and give metric design rules. One thing that
always bugs me is when I do a metric based layout and get design rule
errors because something is 9.84... mil instead of 10 mil. Or I have
even seen design rule checking tools barf on 9.999... which turns out to
be round off error in the durn tool!

On my next design I plan to do all the work and documentation in metric.

 

[rickman]

It makes more efficient use of the available area. Can't you see that
that is better? You can't admit that just in this one tiny thing the
Europeans had a good idea? American paper sizes are all different
shapes... but at least they are *American* shapes goddam it!

I have always thought the paper size thing was a PITA. The sizes aren't
*all* different, they match on every other size. So going from A to C
to E there is no change in proportion, likewise from B to D.

I think that is all a moot point anymore. I never actually print
schematics other than to PDF files. When I last used Orcad I didn't
like the way their default page sizes printed, even in PDF. So I made
my own page size which gave me pages with just big enough text to be
readable in the magnification which let me just see the whole page. I
called it A size, but scaled the sides to fit after the boarders were
appended. It was a real PITA with many iterations of adjustment to get
it to fit perfectly. Then I could use it for some hundreds of pages of
output.

So now I am going to learn to use TinyCAD and may have to do the whole
thing all over...

 

[rickman]

Hello,

these formats divide the area by a factor of 2, but the aspect ratio is
not the same for each format. A and C have the same aspect ratio, also B
and D have the same aspect ratio, but A and B have different aspect
ratios, also C and D.

Only when the aspect ratio is sqrt(2) you may fold it in half and get
the same aspect ratio for the next smaller format also. A0, A1, A2, A3,
A4 and so on have all the same aspect ratio of sqrt(2).

Not to be confused with the "golden rectangle" where you take off a
square and are left with another "golden rectangle".

I wonder if there is some significant advantage of the American way of
sizing paper. I guess it was just about making the dimensions fit round
numbers... well in the sizes above A anyway. BTW, what do they call
half an A sheet? I know it is used, 8.5 x 5.5 inches, for something, I
guess just not engineering drawings. B size is called "Tabloid" in the
printing industry.

 

[rickman]

I don't see what you're getting at...One US fluid ounce of water is
about 1.04 ounces avoirdupois, not 1.00.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

I don't think I can make it any more clear... get it, water... clear... lol!

 

[rickman]

Oh, I forgot the best one: we are still donating blood by the pint.

Actually, I don't think that is exactly correct. They call it a "unit"
and I'm not certain it is still pint. I've been doing platelets lately
and there you give a relatively smaller amount even though it takes a
lot longer. You get to watch a movie while you donate!

 

[Bill Sloman]

Isn't the Kelvin scale based on a number of fixed points?

http://www.its-90.com/realise.html

No. The Kelvin scale is based on two points, absolute zero and the
triple point of water. The other fixed points are just situations you
can set up where the temperature is well-defined. Somebody had to
measure these well-defined temperatures in the first place, but now
that that has been done, people building practical thermometers can
exploit the fact that - for instance - the triple point of mercury
exists at an accurately known temperature to calibrate the devices
they sell and demonstrate their linearity (or well-defined non-
linearity, in the case of platinum resistance thermometers).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermodynamic_temperature

 

[rickman]

Canada reverted back to pounds for food and US gallons which are smaller when free trade started and US goods appeared cheaper as did any food by the pound rather than kg or 2.2lb.

old People still use inches, feet&miles if they prefer but are equally conversant in millimeters and km

But to use 'F which is non-linear is so wrong to be used by any engineers compared to 'C.

The cost of education unfortunately is higher than the benefits of converting to metric for Americans, so they shall be in their archaic units of measure for a long time.

It's not an education issue. Education was the second step of the
conversion program and that remained after the rest was abandoned.
Every school kid knows what °C is and they know about the meter, the
gram, the litre and should know the Newton. But the only time they see
any of these is when the weatherman shows (typically without mentioning)
temperature in Celsius next to the Fahrenheit or the metric size on all
bottles of wine here, so they forget.

 

[rickman]

Different intercept too. Which causes confusion with conversions since
a delta-T of one is just a ratio of the delta-T of the other, but
absolute temperaturs have to have another term in there.

Eg. 100 degrees per second F = 55.556 degrees per second C

100 degrees F = 37.778 degrees C

If everyone used Kelvin this problem could be avoided.

A hot day could be 313K, a very cold day might be 250 or 260K.
Preheat the oven to 450K.

What???! Can't we fix this problem by everyone just using Celsius? We
we really need to use a temperature scale that is optimized for
thermodynamic calculations?

 

[rickman]

There is a Wikipedia article on it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metrication_in_the_United_States

It's missing a section Electronics Engineering. Maybe somebody here can add it. You can reference the Wikipedia page on surface mount technology and printed circuit boards.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface-mount_technology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Printed_circuit_board

If you mean "reference" as in use these pages as references in the other
article, then no, you can't. Wikipedia wisely considers itself to be a
*secondary* reference and does not allow articles to be referenced from
other articles. The insist on the use of primary references.

 

[josephkk]

Hello,

well you should have done some math:

the aspect ratio of A sized drawings being 8.5 by 11 is 1.2941, of B
sized being 11 by 17 is 1.5454 and C sized being 17 by 22 is again 1.2941.

You may scale from A size to C, but not from A to B or from B to C or
vice versa. You can only scale by a factor of 2.

Using the european formats A0 to A6, you are always able to scale by a
factor of 1.4142 or 2 or 2.88284 or 4 up and down.

Bye

I hope you find this interesting, but 8.5 by 11 is the standard printable
window of 9 by 12. Now if you look at scaling pages that are 9 by 12, 18
by 12, 18 by 24 the aspect ratio switching gets even worse 4:3 and 2:3.
but it remains consistent. These sizings are a relic of early
bookbinding. I learned this and more by attending a "GuteFest" Gutenberg
Festival. Are your business cards Virkotyped?

Before you bitch about something it helps to understand where it came
from.

?-)

 

[Gib Bogle]

I thought he was a muslim? Can muslims be socialist too?

He is the unique example

 

[josephkk]

In England, syphilis was "the French disease." In France, syphilis was
"the English disease."

Actually that was Gonorrhea, AKA "the Louie's"

?-)

 

[josephkk]

Whatever mathematical function you wish to pull out, European paper has
the best. sqrt(2) is the only aspect ratio that solves the constraint of
having the long side of size N equal to the short side of N+1 (or, A(N-1)
rather).

I don't like A4 because the aspect ratio sucks. Not only is it illegible
on 1080p monitors (which, incidentally, have an even more despicable
aspect ratio), it simply looks bad with text flowed over. Has no
aesthetic, even with the best choice of margins. 8.5 x 11 is a more
comfortable ratio. So, too, 1600 x 1200 (speaking of which, you can pry
my Trinitron off my cold, dead body ).

Tim

Not true, there is always the golden ratio, about 1.62:1

You can keep your stinky Traintitron with is permanent color fringing.

?-)

 

[John Devereux]

He is the unique example

It's funny how some folk around here get so worked up about the
"communist". He is actually near to the "far right" - and virtually
indistinguishable from a republican - when viewed from a more
dispassionate, global perspective.

http://www.politicalcompass.org/uselection2012

http://www.politicalcompass.org/analysis2

 

[Uwe Hercksen]

It makes more efficient use of the available area. Can't you see that
that is better? You can't admit that just in this one tiny thing the
Europeans had a good idea? American paper sizes are all different
shapes... but at least they are *American* shapes goddam it!

Hello,

it is nice to see that there is at least one here who understands the
idea of european paper sizes.

Bye

 

[Uwe Hercksen]

Whatever mathematical function you wish to pull out, European paper has
the best. sqrt(2) is the only aspect ratio that solves the constraint of
having the long side of size N equal to the short side of N+1 (or, A(N-1)
rather).

I don't like A4 because the aspect ratio sucks. Not only is it illegible
on 1080p monitors (which, incidentally, have an even more despicable
aspect ratio), it simply looks bad with text flowed over. Has no
aesthetic, even with the best choice of margins. 8.5 x 11 is a more
comfortable ratio. So, too, 1600 x 1200 (speaking of which, you can pry
my Trinitron off my cold, dead body ).

Hello,

one more who understands the idea of european paper sizes.

But if 8.5 x 11 is a more comfortable ratio, 11 x 17 is not so
comfortable and 17 x 22 is comfortable again?

For fotos we have the traditional aspect ratio 2:3 from 35 mm film and
3:4 from digital sensors. 16:9 was added later. Not all foto print shops
are able to deliver 4 x 6, 4 x 5.33 and 4 x 7.111 from the same roll of
paper.

Bye

 

[John Devereux]

[...]

Top news item here for the last two weeks... Someone DNA tested a
leading brand of frozen beef lasagne and found it was 10%-100% horse!
Imported from continental Europe, home of those horse-eating Frenchies.

They eat snails, too. And frogs. And all sorts of stinky cheeses.
Basically anything that swims, crawls, flaps, hops, or rots.

I never found a French beer worth buying. Or an electronic instrument.

They are now in the process of testing all the other "beef" products.

Don't know what all the fuss is about, a bit of horse never did anyone
any harm (tosses head... <neigh> <whinny>).

Well, don't be an ass. They probably eat them, too.

<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technolo...at-scandal-Twitters-best-and-worst-jokes.html>

"... A horse is basically just a really fit cow"

<http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18489698>

"What do you call a burnt Tesco burger? Black Beauty."

 

[Uwe Hercksen]

In England, syphilis was "the French disease." In France, syphilis was
"the English disease."

Hello,

Europe is not so simple. The syphilis was called neapolitan, italian,
french, spanic, castilianic, english, scottish and polish disease.

But did you know of this experiment:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_syphilis_experiment

Bye