Aren’t the width measurements done in metric, though?
I believe that in the US the drug trade in general uses metric a lot more than the rest of society. Marijuana is, I think, sold in ounces or by price (e.g. “dime bag”) more often, however. But kilos are used for larger quantities (I recall Arlo Guthrie singing “heading in from Los Angeles, brining in a couple of keys”, for example). And other drugs are commonly sold by the gram.
Same in the US.
US sizes are about 1 or 1.5 off from British sizes, more or less. The EU uses centimeters, I think. Japan uses a completely different scale. For some reason, socks have their own sizing system independent of shoe sizes.
Aren’t the width measurements done in metric, though?
It’s never occured to me before how weird this is, but you are quite correct. Tyre sizes are expressed in the form a/bcRd where a is the width in milimetres, b is the aspect ratio, ie the “height” of the sidewall as a percentage of width (but if not noted otherwise the ratio is 82%), c is the speed rating, which is a measure of the tyres ability to run at a certain speed under a certain load. I can’t remember if the load is supposed to be expressed in imperial or metric, but I think the tables I have seen had both. The R stands for radial and c s the rim size in inches. BMW are the only manufacturer I can think of who have bucked the trend by fitting 235/55ZR390’s to some of their cars. Try getting one of them when you get a flat. I dare you.
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I believe that in the US the drug trade in general uses metric a lot more than the rest of society. Marijuana is, I think, sold in ounces or by price (e.g. “dime bag”) more often, however. But kilos are used for larger quantities (I recall Arlo Guthrie singing “heading in from Los Angeles, brining in a couple of keys”, for example). And other drugs are commonly sold by the gram.
Dime bag? I’m assuming this is an archaic term, but given how cheap petrol is over there i’m not so sure.
How do you think your immigration people would take to the idea of just one more wasted guitar player in L.A?
BTW, how do you insert the groovy quote lines, and how come my winky smilie doesn’t work?
milo, in the context of a dime bag, I’m pretty sure a dime is $10.
The best way of discovering how to use the various codes is to press the ‘quote’ key below any post which contains features you consider to be groovy.
The ‘quote’ function itself is used when a poster wishes to reply to a particular post, and to include some, or all, of the original post for reference.
Dunno about your winkie, but to figure out how to do any formatting(including quotes), click on the little button at the bottom of any post that says “quote.” You’ll get a reply window with the whole post that you are quoting, and you can see what the proper vB code is.
BTW: As of the last time I was in the market, a dime bag isn’t a 10 cents, but $10.
Because a joule is one kilogram meter squared per second squared, while calories require a conversion factor of 4.19 somewhere in there. Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe that in SI, all units are derived directly from the basic units without any conversion factors.
Yeah, it’s a hell of a lot more convenient than selling them by the 1/50,183,333,333,333,333,333,333 mole.
Not any more. All the car ads that mention them give displacement in liters. It’s been that way for about 20 years or so. Before that, displacements were given in cubic inches for domestic cars and cc’s for undomestic.
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Mersavets *
Aviation the world over uses feet for altitude measurements.
[quote]
Nope, some places use meters, which is why I had to learn that 100 feet is approximately 30 meters in ground school.
Airspeed, however, is most common referred to in knots. Here in the States a very old or very slow plane may have the airspeed in miles per hour, and in other countries a small, slow aircraft like an ultralight may have it in kilometers per hour, but those are exceptions. When filing a flight plane you have to give the estimated speed in knots.
A very rough conversion is 10 knots (nautical miles) to 11 statute miles
No, it’s because it’s illegal to sell it in any other measurement than metric. Same as weights and lengths. These are EU regulations.
Shops have been prosecuted for selling things using the imperial measurements. That’s not to say you can’t still buy a pound of potatoes, but it must be priced and sold in its metric equivalent. The pub pint is a special case.
They did the same thing in Ireland. That was sooo annoying driving there. And I think they were still in the process of changing over as some signs gave distance in miles and others in kilometers. It all depended on shape and color of the sign. Or something like that.
Just to give all the furriners a reference point here, in the US, the only common product measured in metric is pop, which can be bought in one, two, or three liter bottles (two being the most common). Smaller bottles, cans, and restaurant servings are still ounces, though. “Scientific” items are usually measured and sold in metric (you’d buy liquid nitrogen in liters, for instance), presumably because scientists are more used to metric than most Americans.
The calorie is a metric unit, but it’s not an SI (International System) unit. It’s derived (indirectly) from metric units (one calorie will heat one gram of water by one Kelvin), and it’s used with the standard metric prefixes (milli-, kilo-, etc.). Other non-SI metric units include the parsec, the Angstrom, and the barn.
Green Bean, I remember when dime bags went up to $15, and we all squawked. (However, the quality had improved, too, so the trade-off wasn’t bad.) That was in the mid-seventies. Now an ounce is over $100, I think. And I’ll bet quality is down; ain’t that the way of things?
In Sweden longer distances are informally referred to in the unit of mil, one mil being 10km. It is a metrification of an earlier unit with the same name equal to 36000 feet, or 10.36km.
I believe that in the US the drug trade in general uses metric a lot more than the rest of society. Marijuana is, I think, sold in ounces or by price (e.g. “dime bag”) more often, however. But kilos are used for larger quantities (I recall Arlo Guthrie singing “heading in from Los Angeles, brining in a couple of keys”, for example). And other drugs are commonly sold by the gram.
This is where it gets interesting. In Britain, dope is sold in imperial 1/16th 1/8th, 1/4 etc of an ounce. The next big measure up is a nine bar (9ozs). Then a weight (1lb)
Coke is sold in grammes apart from the uniquely (?) English Eighth (3.5 grammes for the price of three). Which is an eighth of an oz.
Heroin is sold in bags of no fixed weight, but by price.
Conveniently our cooper coinage is exactly the right weight for these transactions one penny being one eighth of an oz. Bet they didn’t think pof that when they designed them!
And now, noble Fruit and Veg sellers are taking on the might of Europe by defiantly selling thier wares in pounds and ounces, even going to the hight court to defend their right to use the measurements of their choice.
Makes no sense to me…
BTW, I like the idea of simply changing the units of conversion and not telling anyone (1 lb = 500 g), it has a nice simplicity to it…
Many things sold in boxes are presented in dozens sinply because it’s easier to pack them that way - 3x4 is a nice, manageable shape (although egg boxes are often 2x6 which might as well be 2x5, but the first producer to pack them this way will lose trade, as people will think they are getting less for their money)
There was a ‘new’ method of grading the sizes of eggs introduced a number of years back; sizes 1 to 5 with 1 being the largest (IIRC), but we seem to have reverted back to Small, Medium, Large, which makes much more sense.
If you buy online at Tesco (not sure about the other online supermarkets), you can still buy your produce in pounds/ounces*; the software does the conversion and their picking list comes out in kilogrammes, it’s quite clever.
*With most items, you can choose from Each/Ounce/Pound/Gramme/Kilo - I’ve often wondered what would happen if I ordered a single grape.