To answer the SAE and metric question, SAE ground vehicles publications (except the SAE Handbooks) had been 100 % SI for over a decade in the previous millennium Two letters below, both very old, may illustrate the struggle within SAE. The reactionary influence of several members in the SAE leadership was insurmountable.
Dear Mr. Morris: I appreciate your editorial "Think globally, act locally." I agree with you that SAE, its staff and members, should follow that credo. To act locally within SAE means to me also implementing SAE Metric Policy that guides SAE to the exclusive use of SI units - your thinking globally. The intent behind the SAE metric policy and guide was to be make SAE global and also to help AEI readers to acquire the knowledge and feel for sizes in this global language of measurement. That imposes a duty on the magazine that it should adhere 100 % to the proper writing of SI units and terms (as stipulated in, for example, its own guide and in IEEE/ASTM and ISO guides). AEI is deficient in that respect. Its resorting back to the dual units has prevented older readers from acquiring the feel and comfort working with the units, comfort that is obtained easiest by seeing familiar values expressed in SI. Equally important, the data in SI should appear consistently as the rules for writing dictate..Some time ago I submitted to the AEI editor the below enclosed letter. I did not see it published nor have I received an acknowledgement of its receipt. Stan Jakuba Member of the SAE Metric Board I have a wish for SAE on its 100th anniversary. A century ago, this Society was formed to, among others, write, issue and promote engineering standards in the USA. As it now become international, it decided to use the international language of measurement, SI metric. It issued a policy and a guide to metrication, and its ground vehicles publications adhered to the guide as the Society policy directed. Several years ago, in violation of the policy, dual units were introduced into the publications. Subsequently, inconsistencies in the use of measuring units in SAE publications became common. With metric units, for example, non-SAE-Guide units such as the bar replaced the pascal for no apparent reason that would have required the violation of the SAE Guide. I wish that this 100th anniversary be taken as an opportunity to return to the measuring units aspect of standardization. I wish that the Society editors learn the standardized use of the measuring units, the rules of SI, and that SAE publications reflect the rules as they have been documented in the Guide. It will make SAE look more professional in all industrialized countries. SI units predominate in professional publications worldwide, just as the SAE metrication policy predicted years ago it would. SAE committed itself to guide the phasing in of SI units and metric standards on the domestic front. A consistent presentation of SI units and SI rules for writing will help other US publications learn what is correct. Let us accept this leadership role; let us be consistently correct. Stan Jakuba SAE member for over 30 years
