Imperial ‘v’ Metric Measurement
One of the woody’s has asked the question below – maybe the waitematawoody boat builders or in fact any one, might be able to help.
“When did the marine industry in New Zealand change from imperial to metric measurement?. It might be an ‘old wives tale’ but I’m told some of the older boatbuilders felt they could get greater accuracy with imperial over metric, but I wonder when the practice finally died out”.
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I’d suggest of you ask the Paul Tingeys and Robert Brookes of this world, they never changed to metric 🙂
JP
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Back in the 1981 I bought a ruler in the USA that had printed on it “USA is going metric inch-by-inch”. It was an imperial ruler
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In the mid 70s, at the same time as the country – and indeed the world – went to metric. And yes, Virginia, even the USA, though they still haven’t properly changed over. The Imperial measurements are not legal measurements any more – it’s illegal to sell anything in other than metric measurements.
As to the accuracy question, it’s actually the other way round. Many boat builders considered metrics too accurate (or too precise) for working in wood.
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