10ths? What kind of fuckery is that? Why not just work in the metric system? Focus: I can't iron for shit, so I have to hang my clothes up immediately after they get out of the dryer in order to minimize wrinkles.
Architects and builders use Feet-Inches-Fractional Inches. That building wall is 24'-6" long. Cut that stud at 8'-2 1/4". Engineers and contractors use Feet-Tenths-Hundreths. That pipe is 80' long. Set the invert at 453.27. The more you know . . .
Doesn't really answer my question though. Why would Engineers bother using tenths & hundreds instead of just going with the metric system? Would seem more logical to me.
Several reasons. The first, and biggest, is convention. For hundreds of years the Imperial system was how building supplies were measured. Most sawmills and production facilities were designed with this in mind. Therefore, even though the metric system is technically the "official" system of choice (at least in Canada), materials are still produced in Imperial and simply converting to a different system leaves you with awkward numbers to work with. There's the conceptual factor, too. Most people can picture what 6'0" looks like. They have a harder time with 1.75 metres. Next, the United States refuses to change. Since they are responsible for so much of the product in the world that's bought and sold, it makes sense to use what they use. Lastly, although the metric system looks good on paper, it isn't as nice to use as the Imperial system in some ways. The units of measure are more nicely spaced in Imperial (for example, it's a big jump from a centimeter to a metre; an inch to a foot isn't so severe), and they are based on squares. An inch can be divided, and divided, and divided, and still produces round fractions. It's much more cumbersome to measure out 1.239384 metres (or millimetres). It should be noted that - in Canada - all commercial and industrial work and/or anything for the government must be done in millimeters. The blueprints for these jobs always reflect the metric system. Personally, I prefer working in Imperial. Maybe I prefer it because that's how I've always done it, but a 24' x 48' building with 8' walls makes way more sense than whatever the metric equivalent is. Now, back to your regularly scheduled programming...
Once you get out of length measurements the imperial systems gets shitty fast. Fuck slugs/ft^3, I'd much rather deal in kg/m^3
Fuck you all. My dad owned an engineering supplies store when I was growing up and we had to carry metric and imperial everything because we had to supply parts for stuff from all over the world. We'd have guys come in who had no idea what they were after, giving fucked up mish mashed measurements and we had to sort out what they wanted. Sometimes it came down to the thread measurement to determine whether it was UNF, UNC or metric. I had the "good, young eyes", so this was usually my job to compare. On the upside, I was killer at fractions, ratios and dimensions at school.
I can't fold laundry to save my life, but then again I've always been good enough with women to not have to learn.
Just to beat this horse a little more. On the mechanical eng side of life, Imperial is still around because farmer Bob's equipment is all in inches. I really do not like imperial for the designing machinery because it turns into a raging pain in the ass. I dont want to deal with threads in imperial (1/4" thread clearance is 1/16" larger than the nominal (aka not actual) diameter....ffs) Metric is fantastic. Someone came along and said, well, we could just make things easy. 6mm thread? cut the shaft to 6mm, thread it (with a single pitch, at least until you get to above 10mm diameters), all clearance holes are +0.5mm. So easy. But on to the Focus Terrible at writing things. Spelling? BAH! Proper Grammar? Bah! What I am good at: Running numbers in my head. I can give you the tip on a bill, add numbers, in my head and pretty fast.
FOCUS: I can't do basic multiplication tables to save my life. I can do math, but I need a calculator. Multiples of 2,4,5,10 ect. ect., A.K.A. the easy ones I can do. When you get into multiples of 6,7,8, and 9 though is when I look at you with a dumb face, and then a little drool leaves the corner of my mouth. On a side note my math teachers always bitched how we had to learn to do it by hand because "one day you won't have a calculator." I considered this a empty argument, because by the time I was in high school (graduated 2006) everyone had cell phones, and all of them had calculator functions by then. ALT-FOCUS: My only real decent claim to fame is I suppose I have above-average grammar and spelling compared to the rest of America. As far as negative skills go I can smoke, a lot. In Kuwait we got bored and had a smoking competition. I smoked 9 Parliament Lights, with all the filters torn off, in 6 minutes. The competition was still a 3-way tie. This was back in my smoking heyday, when I would destroy a pack and a half a day. Thankfully I have cut down to roughly 10 cigarettes a day since I've gotten out, and still working on quitting completely.
ALT-FOCUS: As a kid, I liked to study geography and was pretty knowledgeable on the subject. One thing that just really annoys me is when people lack simple geography knowledge. It's surprising how many people dont know where major US cities or world countries are located. One thing in particular that drives me crazy, is when I am out of town or on vacation and somebody asks me where I'm from...and when I say "West Virginia" they reply with "Oh, what town are you from" or "Oh, that's cool, like near Richmond?" No, it's a fucking state!
It's funny that even though I'm excellent at world geography, if you tell me "Yeah, I'm gonna be in Pittsburgh this weekend," it takes me 5-10 seconds to figure out whether Pittsburgh is in Pennsylvania, Ohio, or somewhere around there. But I'll point to Burundi on a map with ease.
I repped you with this, but didn't quite have the space to clarify. If someone says they're from a state, it's natural to follow up by asking what part of the state specifically. I don't see how that betrays a lack of geography knowledge. If I tell someone I'm from New Jersey and they say "Oh, like near Newark? My aunt lives up there," that doesn't mean they don't know New Jersey is a state. They're just interested in what part of Jersey I'm from. Unless you are somehow from every part of the state at the same time. Then yeah, I guess you have the right to be irritated.
I should have clarified that when they would respond with, "What town are you from?" they mean "What town are you from in Virginia?" because they think that I am from the Western part of Virginia and have no idea that there is a state named West Virginia.