Date: Fri, 26 May 2000 11:35:05 +0100
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: RE: H Re: Getting a new libretto screen.
Almost right Michael - the US system of weights and measures is the English
system, but with just enough subtle differences to make it confusing, one of
them being that a US ton is 2000lb while a British ton is 2240lb. (That's 20
hundredweight of course, each hundredweight being 112lb or 8 stone...)
Our gallons and pints are slightly bigger than yours as well - our pints are 20
fl.oz. instead of your 16 fl.oz. (This still doesn't explain why our petrol
costs so much more per gallon than yours!) Back when I worked in the chemical
industry a popular foaf-tale was that an engineer bought a 500-gallon vessel
from an American company, shipped it over, installed it and tried to pump 500
_British_ gallons into it, resulting in the surplus 100 British gallons of
sulphuric acid spilling on to the floor and the plant being evacuated...
Is this OT enough yet? :-)
...Andy Lawn
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> From: "Berlant, Michael S" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Subject: RE: H Re: Getting a new libretto screen.
>
> Actually, I believe that a tonne is about 10% more than a ton. As I
> understand it (shields up), a ton is 2,000 pounds and a tonne is 1,000
> kilograms. The really sticky part is that the US seems to be the only
> country in the world still stuck using the English system of weights and
> measures (shields down).
>
> At least we have always divided our currency into 100 parts, and not 12 of
> this and 20 of that.
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