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Systems of M easurement

Systems of M easurement. History.

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Systems of M easurement

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  1. Systems of Measurement

  2. History • The French Revolution gave rise to the metric system, and this has spread around the world, replacing most customary units of measure. In most systems, length (distance), weight, and time are fundamental quantities; or as has been now accepted as better in science, the substitution of mass for weight, as a better more basic parameter. Some systems have changed to recognize the improved relationship, notably the 1824 legal changes to the imperial system. • Later science developments showed that either electric charge or electric current must be added to complete the minimum set of fundamental quantities by which all other metrological units may be defined. Other quantities, such as power, speed, etc. are derived from the fundamental set; for example, speed is distance per unit time. Historically a wide range of units was used for the same quantity, in several cultural settings, length was measured in inches, feet, yards, fathoms, rods, chains, furlongs, miles, nautical miles, stadia, leagues, with conversion factors which were not simple powers of ten or even simple fractions within a given customary system. • Nor were they necessarily the same units (or equal units) between different members of similar cultural backgrounds. It must be understood by the modern reader that historically, measurement systems were perfectly adequate within their own cultural milieu, and the understanding that a better more universal system (based on more rationale and fundamental units) only gradually spread with the maturation and appreciation of the rigor characteristic of Newtonian physics. Moreover, changing a measurement system has real fiscal and cultural costs as well as the advantages that accrue from replacing one measuring system with a better one. • Once the analysis tools within that field were appreciated and came into widespread use in the emerging sciences, especially in the applied sciences like civil and mechanical engineering, pressure built up for conversion to a common basis of measurement. As people increasingly appreciated these needs and the difficulties of converting between numerous national customary systems became more widely recognised there was an obvious justification for an international effort to standardise measurements. The French Revolutionary spirit took the first significant and radical step down that road.

  3. Imperial and US customary units • Both imperial units and US customary units derive from earlier English units. Imperial units were mostly used in the British Commonwealth and the former British Empire but in most Commonwealth countries they have been largely supplanted by the metric system. They are still used for some applications in the United Kingdom but have been mostly replaced by the metric system in commercial, scientific, and industrial applications. US customary units, however, are still the main system of measurement in the United States. While some steps towards metrication have been made (mainly in the late 1960s and early 1970s), the customary units have a strong hold due to the vast industrial infrastructure and commercial development. • While imperial and US customary systems are closely related, there are a number of differences between them. Units of length and area (the inch, foot, yard, mile etc.) are identical except for surveying purposes. The Avoirdupois units of mass and weight differ for units larger than a pound (lb.). The imperial system uses a stone of 14 lb., a long hundredweight of 112 lb. and a long ton of 2240 lb. The stone is not used in the US and the hundredweights and tons are short being 100 lb. and 2000 lb. respectively. • Where these systems most notably differ is in their units of volume. A US fluid ounce (fl oz) c. 29.6 millilitres (ml) is slightly larger than the imperial fluid ounce (28.4 ml). However, as there are 16 US fl oz to a US pint and 20 imp fl oz per imperial pint, these imperial pint is about 20% larger. The same is true of quarts, gallons, etc. Six US gallons are a little less than five imperial gallons.

  4. Units of currency • A unit of measurement that applies to money is called a unit of account. This is normally a currency issued by a country or a fraction thereof; for instance, the US dollar and US cent (1⁄100 of a dollar), or the euro and euro cent. • ISO 4217 is the international standard describing three letter codes (also known as the currency code) to define the names of currencies established by the International Organization for Standardization (IOS).

  5. Conversion tables • Approximate conversion of unitsConversion of units

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