Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Why the U.S doesn't use the Metric System

I thought you hated the English and kicked them out? LOL

I'm of the age that I learned imperial and then we switched to the metric system up here as I was leaving high school. And then I ended up being a surveyor in my 20s so worked with imperial plans (feet) and metric plans (metres) so in a way I'm lucky I guess. I can use either comfortably and don't bother converting back and forth just use the unit that applies. Speaking of which that's the secret to it, don't bother converting just use what's used. A metre's about 39 inches, but really who GAF its just a metre, a good sized pace. I've also worked in ancient plans in chains. And I've done some nautical stuff using fathoms. For those that must convert a chain is 66 feet and a fathom is around 6 feet. I just go by my "wingspan" is just short of a fathom and a chain is about 3 crew cab pickups bumper to bumper.

The easiest of them all is metric though. Fractions are for very simple math and bad planning, nothing more. Decimal places is how we count, how we come up with percentages and how our brain works. However I won't be giving any of my tape measures away when I build stuff out of lumber its feet inches eighths and sixteenths. Its how all the stock is made, how I learned and how everybody still does it. Also I weigh about 210 lbs but I don't bother dividing that by 2.2 to figure out what that is in kilograms.

In this world there are two systems. The system used by the only country in the world to put a man on the moon and return them home safe and sound and then there is everybody else. Who haven't.

We shipped the German's, Italian's, and Japanese's asses so they should use our system!

NASA uses the metric system, just sayin

Was going to post that earlier, but decided I'd been enough of a kill joy !

If god had wanted us to use metric, he would have given us ten fingers. Oh, wait???
That said, I am quite familiar with standard, but do appreciate metric, and it's simplicity.

Metric sucks. I have two sets of tools because of it. I could have one completely awesome set instead.

We should, and we do.

Ha ha !! Except when someone forgets math!!


In September of 1999, after almost 10 months of travel to Mars, the Mars Climate Orbiter burned and broke into pieces. On a day when NASA engineers were expecting to celebrate, the ground reality turned out to be completely different, all because someone failed to use the right units, i.e., the metric units! The Scientific American Space Lab made a brief but interesting video on this very topic.


https://www.simscale.com/blog/2017/12/nasa-mars-climate-orbiter-metric/

A lot of Farvas in here ordering a liter of cola....

Conservatives killed the metric system in this country because the feared it would lead to one world government and was a Communist conspiracy. If you don’t believe me, look at political debates in the 1960s, 70s and 80s.

Yeah, gotta make sure the right system is used. I recall a passenger plane crash shortly after take-off because the luggage was weighed in kg but thought was pounds and ended up being overloaded in the rear of the plane - it went nose high, stalled and crashed. I think there has also been an incident with fuel weight being done in the wrong system and ended up running out and crashing at sea.

LOL .....

Because we have American Express card limits higher than your piss ant metric number will even count.

Sorry, i've been wanting to say that for decades.

Let the free market decide. The mandates always fail. If the end users ask for it then the suppliers will make it.

I think it's humorous that we (the revolutionaries) still use English units while the British have to use the Metric System.

The brits are still confused... They drive miles and use miles per hour... They measure with the Imperial system 20% more than a US gallon....pint,... quart...

Yep, the Saturn V was 10 meters in diameter, (33'). Just saying. NASA translated their stuff to English for the news and the American people to understand. We are the last country in the world to convert to the metric system. All scientists, the medical profession, NASA, the military, so we are already halfway there. Even the car manufacturing is moving to metric.

The cost of converting to metric would be more than most people realize. Imagine having to buy all new metric measuring tools if you're working in a shop that makes parts that have to be measured. If I get a metric drawing in my shop I have to convert the dimensions so I can measure what I'm building. Digital measuring devices can be changed with a button but if you use tools that are not digital that's not an option. So many things in the tool and die trade were designed around our system years ago. Just look through a machinist handbook. If you want to use metric then be my guest.

I find it interesting that we use a base 60 system for time...........

yet for distance we start with a base 12 system (the foot)...............then for longer measurements we use yards (Base 3?) and multiples thereof..............until we reach miles, then we're on a decimal (Base 10) system of sorts as in our mileposts are in miles and tenths.

But sometimes we want other measurements like inches and fractions thereof...............unless you're using an engineering ruler or tape, then that's in 10ths too. and then as someone mentioned, there's machining................lets make something 3.0015 or three and fifteen thousandths inches, (basically as I understand it mixing a base 12 and a base 10 system)

Weights are cool too. Pounds and ounces (base 16?). Unless you're a reloader, then you use grains and tenths thereof. Unless you need 7001 grains, then you go back to using pounds for the major increment.

Measures??? WTF teaspoons and fractions , then tablespoons, then cups and fractions of them (dry or liquid??), pints, quarts, gallons, bushels, pecks, pinches, dashes, sprinkles, whatever...............

Man, that "English" system sure sound smart to me.

Have seen some posts complaining about our French compatriots having come up with the dumb metric system and that being enough reason to want to avoid it. Well, it seems I heard somewhere some Frenchy came up with the first workable smokeless powder and most of us here really like that stuff (Digital Dan, Kaywoodie, Birdy, and a few others of us still like Lord Black though). Couple of French dudes came up with the design and built Lady Liberty, and I'd say the majority of us approve of that gal, no? And what about some French words most of us manly types enjoy.............Derriere..............Decolletage.......

Let us not forget croissants and eclairs too...................I love them things! ( I like English muffins too, but give me a choice of one or and eclair and it's no contest)

I bought some Euro " Gerry Cans" a few years back...............Not hard for me to figure out the 20L ones are basically 5 gal................Looking at them I can't tell the difference................and they work and don't have silly spill proof spouts and scheidt to go on them.

The dumbazz gov't does that and I retire that very freakin' DAY!