It might have been Whithworth, but I think that it is an older metric
thread.
Before the Second World War France was usually able to keep out non
metric units and standards. It was in 1944/5 when the great ifp invasion
took
place in metric Europe, and the battle then raged on into the early sixties.
The
French civil and mining engineer Maurice Danloux-Dumesnils and the magazine
Mesures et Controles Industriels were in the forefront of the struggle. It
was this
magazine that uncovered a conspiracy in 1956 to adopt a 55 mph speed limit
on French highways.
In the fifties one could have a weird experience on French inland flights.
All announcements, in English AND IN FRENCH, were done in ifp *only*. If I
had been on such a flight I would have had to use one of these paper sacks.
M-thread is a postwar one, I think that it is a metric version of Unified
Thread. When we abandoned Whithword it was in the balance whether we
would adopt inch Unified or M thread. However, our industry overwhelmingly
choose M thread. Too bad for the BWMA and F2M.
Han
----- Original Message -----
From: "kilopascal" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Sunday, January 14, 2001 2:39 AM
(John, this must have been produced by your computer)
Subject: [USMA:10455] French fasteners circa 1944
2001-01-13
In the autumn of 1944 my father was in the US army ETO and at that time was
in Paris. While there, he bought some souvenirs. One in particular that
my mother still has is an inkwell....
<snip>
