Metric or inches

Bill McQueen

Member
Messages
140
Location
Lincoln AR
I just bought a wooden steam engine set of plans and wanted try it out because I've built a lot of aluminum and steel ones ( maybe more like a few).

Here's the deal. I got the plans and there all in metric. I know how to convert, there are down loadable rulers, charts. etc. But they don't have the (.) like 42.2 just the 42 and very small lines.

There are a lot of ways to go I'm just not sure which way. I can sit down and convert all the measurement which there a lot of them, I don't know, just throw something at me.

Thanks Bill
 
Like Don said, just do it in metric if you can. Otherwise, you're gonna need a good calculator. My older TI-68 will convert to many more decimal places than you'd ever need.

The idea of a wooden steam engine intrigues me. Where'd you get the plans?
 
Hi folks,
Some years ago I saw a method in a magazine. Maybe "Live Steam." If you just convert with a calculator, you end up with a bunch of hard to work with numbers. For instance, convert 10 mm to .3937 in. Now what? What if that's the size of some stock material? You're stuck making special stuff. The method was to convert each millimeter to one sixteenth of an inch. So, the 10 mm becomes 10/16" = 5/8". Now you have a sensible inch number to work with. A side effect of this is that everything gets larger because 1/16" is bigger than 1 mm. Just fine if you're making a something to no particular scale. May even be better for a wood engine, since the parts would be bigger.
Not so good for furniture, I guess. :)

Good luck,
Bob
 
Work in millimeters. No 'systems' to remember. No conversions. Acquire dual measure tapes and rules and effortlessly switch from one to the other. Whichever is the most expedient at the moment. Only stubbornness makes this hard. Everyone on this board is more than bright enough to incorporate this. It is simply counting in whole numbers in groups of ten. Math and calculations are easier - no fractions, save maybe a half a millimeter for close work.

The confusion can lie in the fact that sheet goods now are measured in millimeters but cutters are not. Thus there is a discrepancy between the 19mm sheet and the 3.4" router bit. Go with the closest.

There are conversion charts all over the Internet. Download and print one out for the shop so you have a visual idea where you are one with the other.

Only real downside to working in both systems is that there is no fun in complaining about how user un-friendly one it as opposed to the other.
 
Thanks for response. All you do is put the metric in and x by o,39 and you have you inches . in fact it can be just .39

As to the steam it's really air or vacuum. They just call it steam engine even mine that are made of metal run on compressed air.

Thanks Bill
 
This post reminds me of the time when the USA was suposed to convert to metric. LOML said they cant do that how am I gonna cook. I don't know what liters are. :rolleyes:
There's a streatch of freeway from Tucson to Nogalas Mexico where there are no mile markers, only km markers. Seems that it was built during the time when we were thinking of switching to metric.

Does anyone know how and inch was determined. 1 inch equals 2 barly corns. Sure hope the barley grows uniformly..:rofl:
 
Work in millimeters. No 'systems' to remember. No conversions. Acquire dual measure tapes and rules and effortlessly switch from one to the other. Whichever is the most expedient at the moment. Only stubbornness makes this hard. Everyone on this board is more than bright enough to incorporate this. It is simply counting in whole numbers in groups of ten. Math and calculations are easier - no fractions, save maybe a half a millimeter for close work.

The confusion can lie in the fact that sheet goods now are measured in millimeters but cutters are not. Thus there is a discrepancy between the 19mm sheet and the 3.4" router bit. Go with the closest.

There are conversion charts all over the Internet. Download and print one out for the shop so you have a visual idea where you are one with the other.

Only real downside to working in both systems is that there is no fun in complaining about how user un-friendly one it as opposed to the other.

Excellent post Carol :clap:

I grew up in Canada at a time when the imperial system was on the way out, and the metric system was on the way in, so we had to learn both, boy we complained about that, but now I'm glad we did have to learn both, because I can work in both easily.

If I have my choice, I'll choose metric, it is a LOT simpler, groups of 10, and I have 10 fingers and ten toes, not twelve :D :wave:
 
on one of my recent trips to Canada I was happy there was a button on my cars computer to convert to metric for the speed limits. not easy to figure out while driving and the sign changes and those Canadians tailgate ya:D
 
Not to hijack the thread but this post does post sone interesting thought. I am a physicist, yes i Knows so what. Well in Physics we used metric most of the time namely because of the 10 base numbering system.Now that we know what an inch is a meter well from what I have been told there is a piece of metal that is very stable (titanium, aluminum, unubtaniam) some metel that is very stable and it is kept in a tempertuture controled valt in a bank in switherland that has a line scribed on it that it 1 meter long ( somewhere about 89 barley corns from the end). so I guess that all meter tape measures are calibrated to that. Now Noah, he never heard of of inches or meters. He used Cubits. So as Bill Cosby would say whats a cubit. Well it turn out a Cubic is the length from one elbow to ones fingure tips. I guess my cubit is differant from yours. :huh::dunno:

OK back to your regular programing. sorry for the hijack.
:rofl:
 
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Bill,
You will probably find it easier to use use the metric.... back when I was shipping, I used to make money on the conversions from metric weights to imperial weights... I could sell in imperial weights and buy in metric and the difference was enough sometimes to make a big difference in the profitability of the shipment. :D

There isn't really an exact conversion and you will be left working with fractions of fractions which may throw your tolerances off.
 
Yes Bill don't try to convert it will just create more problems for you. Metric is really easy as everythinmg works in 10's. Good luck looking forward to the pics of the project.

Drew. Wat yer forgetting is that us Yankees is stubborn. Fergit logic. We likes inches. And that's it. Don't need to make sense. Metrics just look, feel and taste funny to me. ;)
 
I would do as Carol suggests, if you want to make the conversion there is a piece of software called MasterConverter that you can dowload for trial that converts any unit in another, it has even biblical measures!

Have you build any stirling engine as well?
 
GUESS WHAT! I found a Stanley Lever Lock Tape. It has on the front 8m/ 26 on the it.

It has standard and right below metric and they both line up!
9.95 at Lowe's Part number 30-824.

Thanks again

Ps. I also found Metric ruler (plastic) at Office Depot 2.99. :thumb:
 
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