Nad R wrote:
echinosum wrote:
Nad R;927420 Wrote:
I have traveled to Canada on occasion. Canada uses the Imperial
Gallon as
4.5 liters. Where the US Gallon is 3.7 liters for gasoline
containers.

So can I assume we both learned something here?
You now know what the English System is now?

And that we both need to be conscious of the English vs Imperial
differences?
In the US every day life people use the English System. In the
Science Arena is the only area in the US that uses the Metric
System in which I am
also familure with.

But as you stated you seem to use a mixed system, Celsius for
temperature
and inches for measurement. Is this common to mix it up in your
part of the
world? Here in the US the two systems are separate, no mix. It is
one or
the other.
I was in Guatemala once. Small size drink bottles were 12 oz, larger
ones were 1 litre. Mixes of measures are not uncommon.

Here in Britain:
Petrol is sold in litres but roads are measured in miles.
Unfortunately fuel consumption is only available in mpg or
litres/100km, when it would make much more sense if it was reported
as miles/litre or litres/100 miles. Some oldies have to convert
litres to gallons in their head, to understand what they are buying,
but I haven't discussed gallons with anyone for many years, except
hidden in mpg fuel consumption measures.

The weather forecast is given in celcius as the prime measure, (with
Frankenstein in parenthesis on occasion). Although a few over 50s
still think in Frankenstein, celcius (often given its old name
centigrade) is what is in common use.

Beer and milk are sold in pints, but all other liquids are sold in
litres. So there is still an understanding of pints for consumable
liquids.

Recipe books and scales still use pounds/oz with metric alternative.
So although food is sold in kg in shops, pounds/oz remain deeply
engrained. Personally I mainly use metric, though certain recipes
I've been using for decades I still think in oz. US recipes in cups
confuse us terribly. I have stuck a label on my scales 1 cup = 225g,
for translation from US recipe books.

Even though in theory metric, a lot of packaged things are sold in
amounts of "about a pound", sometimes precisely 454g, but often 400g,
450g, 500g. Although certain things have legally prescribed package
sizes: wine can be sold as 375ml, 500ml, 750ml, 1000ml, and no other
sizes in this range. So the old practice of selling you 720ml, 700ml,
even 690ml I saw once, is outlawed.

Everything in DIY shops is metric. Working off plans, builders use
mm. But people know their height in feet and inches and it is a rare
person who readily knows it in mm, although that is how the doctor
will record it on your medical records. People still give
approximations in inches, even young people, though they never do
any sums at school in such amounts.

So, apart from miles for roads (in fact it is illegal to measure
roads in km, a council who put up some metric signs had to take them
down) and pints for beer and milk, just about everything else is
legally required to be metric in Britain. After 30-40 years, we are
are increasingly getting used to them. But inches/feet and pounds/oz
remain engrained in the culture, even for young people, even though
they learn nothing about them at school.

So I see said the blind man. Here in the US I have noticed most modern
books on baking no longer measure dry goods by volume. Many of the
newer books on baking measure dry goods by weight because items like
flour can very from different sources. When they go by weight the
baked goods tend to more consistent.

But remember the first line. A gallon is not same as a gallon in
Canada. A pint in the US is sixteen ounces, some countries a pint is
twenty ounces ( I think ).


It's worse than the difference in ounces per pint (or gallon). The US fluid
ounce is not the same as the Imperial fluid ounce either.

The interesting thing is you can agree over what is in a bottle of scotch.
A US fifth (one fifth of a US gal) is the same as one sixth of an Imperial
gallon which was the traditional size for wine and spirit bottles. So all
those bottles of Laphroaig were despatched for US consumption only needed
new labels. With metric conversion those scotch bottles were rounded to
750ml and now somehow to 700ml. The universe is clearly shrinking.

David