when did the UK adopt the metric system of linear measurement?
534945
It has only partly done so.  Other than resistance from consumers meaning old and metric systems are quoted together on food and drinks, and clothes sizes and other bought goods (except for pretrol for some reason) - Speedomoters in cars and speed limits remain in miles - not kilometres/ per hour.  The introduction of the dual system was in the early/mid seventies shortly after they joined the EEC.
991346
we are on the metric system. as a child I was told that the whole country would be metric by 1976
451913
In the UK before 1971, there was a different monetary system in place, with three basic levels - pounds, shillings and pence.\nPence is another word for pennies, or single coins like 1 cent pieces.\nIn the old "Imperial" system, it worked like this:\n1/4 of a penny = farthing\n1/2 of a penny = half-penny (or ha'penny)\n1 penny = 1 "pence"\n3 pence - Threepenny piece (or Thruppenny Bit)\n6 pence - Sixpence\n12 pence = 1 shilling\n20 shillings = 1 pound \nMaking 240 pennies, or pence, to the pound.\n\nThere were other coins amounting to specific amounts within the system. The Florin, for instance, was worth two shillings (or 24 pence). The Half-Crown, just for fun, was worth two shillings and six pence (30 pence in total) and the Crown, understandably, was worth two Half-Crowns (equivalent to 5 shillings, or 70 pence). And finally the Guinea, which was worth one pound and one shilling (21 shillings, or 252 pence)\n\nIn 1971, the UK joined the metric system, based on there being 100 pence in every pound. The currency was also revalued, so that a shilling was now only worth 5 pence, rather than 12, so that there were still 20 shillings in a pound (largely to help people deal with the change when budgetting their weekly shopping!)\n\nAs far as I know the Crown and Half-Crown are no longer in active use - if you think about it, a half-crown, being worth two shillings and six pence, would now be a coin worth 16 pence, which is a little unweildy for shopping purposes. And similarly, the crown, being worth five shillings, would now be worth one pound twenty-five pence.\n\nSo now in the UK, we have the following units\n1p - one penny or one pence\n2p - two pence\n5p - five pence (one shilling)\n10p - ten pence (two shillings)\n20p - twenty pence (for some reason, calling this four shilings hasn't caught on)\n50p - fifty pence (ten shillings)\n£1 - one pound\n£2 - two pounds - the newest coin to be introduced. After this we go to notes, with £5 being the first.\n\nHowever, just to confuse matters even further, you'll still find mention of guineas and crowns in particular settings - several high-profile horse races award prizes in guineas and crowns. But for the majority of the population, they don't exist as actual coins any more. Incidentally, while researching this answer, I've discovered there was also a half-guinea and a five-guinea coin prior to decimalisation. \n\nSource(s):\n\nhttp://www.johnowensmith.co.uk/histdate/...\nhttp://www.simetric.co.uk/si_imperial.ht...\nhttp://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl...\nhttp://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl...
596668
That was the old definition of a metre. It was later changed because somehow they determined it wasn't accurate (like the distance between those two points became ten million and two metres.) I believe the current definition of a metre is the distance light travels in 1/299792458 of a second, but I've also heard it defined in terms of a certain number of wavelengths of a krypton laser.
521136
i was just reading about this issue the other day on a website and would you beleive that america was the first country to want to move to metric system but after a long time of not agreeing on issues it was dropped. it had been discussed on and off for nearly 60 years. nobody still knows why it never went ahead.
6536
No one person invented the Metric System, but it dates to 18th century France.  You're right, we do already have a system, called Standard that has pounds, ounces and so on.  The reason that Metric is prefered (and indeed used by almost all developed nations except the United States) is simple:  How many ounces are in a gallon? How many square feet are in an acre?  How many inches are in a yard?  These questions yeild the following answers; .0078, 2.29 x 10^-5 and 36, not easy numbers to work with.  With Metric, the major marking points are 10, 100, 1000, and so on.  The modern metric system also uses extremely sophisticated ways of getting precise measurements based on natural objects (the size of the earth, the weight of water and so on).
237460
May 10, 1954\n\nhttp://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9343590?tocId=9343590
562710
July 1884\n\nI hope this helps ... the link below explains more and is very informative as well.\n\n- Alan
941303
Why aren't you Americans using metric yet?\nDrag yourself into last century already!
759406
There's the English system, using feet, pounds and seconds.\n\nThere are the two metric systems, differing only in where you put the decimal point.  The cgs system is centimeter-gram-second.  The mks system is meter-kilogram-second.  These are also called SI (System Internationale).
1116867
try the conversion table. europe uses metrics
392192
it was introduced i the uk in 1988 but benn in use in america since the erly 70's
389088
In England, the Winchester standards were used since the 15th Century. They were slowly modified, as usual: at the beginning of the 18th Century, we had a wine gallon containing 231 cubic inches, an ale gallon of 282 cubic inches and even a corn ("Winchester") gallon. The bushel was defined at a time as "any round measure with a plain and even bottom, being 18.5 inches wide throughout and 8 inches deep" (hence its official US definition : 2150.42 cu.in.)\n\nThe Weights and Measures Act of 1824 defined an Imperial British Gallon to replace all others : it was to contain 10 pounds of pure water at 62°F (possibly inspired by the decimal system) (= 4.54609 liters). \n\nAt the same time in the US, the old wine gallon (also called Queen Anne's gallon) just discarded in England became the new official US Gallon (= 3.785411784 liters).\n\nAt least in England, they had a common system for liquid and dry measures thereafter.\n\nIn the US, there are two systems : for liquid measures, the base is the US Gallon just mentioned. The dry measures are based on the old Winchester Gallon (= 4.404884 liters) or 268.8025 cubic inches.\n\nFYI, general measures of capacity:\n\n2 gills = 1 cup \n2 cups = 1 pint \n2 pints = 1 quart \n2 quarts = 1 pottle \n2 pottles = 1 gallon \n2 gallons = 1 peck \n4 pecks = 1 bushel \n3 bushels = 1 bag \n12 bags = 1 chauldron or chaldron
843622
The first decimal coins, the 5p and 10p came out in 1968 but the official changeover came later...\n\nOn the 15th of February 1971, after a great deal of opposition and discussion, the UK changed from £ s d (pounds, shillings and pence) to a decimal system. \nI remember having some decimal coins, I think it was the 10p piece with 1969 stamped on it so I guess it was a gradual changeover to give people chance to get used to it. However it was phased in for the 15th Feb 71.\n\nThe change was quite substantial. For example on the 14th of February £1 was equal to 20 shillings which was equivalent to 240 pence. \n\nOn the 15th of February £1 was equal to 100 new pence. In preparation some coins were removed from circulation and others were introduced. In 1968 the five pence piece was introduced to replace the shilling and the ten pence piece was introduced to replace the florin. The half penny was withdrawn from circulation in 1969. Finally in 1970 the half crown was withdrawn from circulation and a new twenty pound note was issued.\n\nI hope this answers your question...\n\nGraham
1000898
The metric system is based on multiplies of 10 and matematically is easier to divide or multiply by 10 than other convertion factors. Actually the ethimology of the words indicate the factor that have been applied to an unit (eg: on "centimeter", the prefix "centi" means 100, then centimeter means a hundredth of a meter or 0.01m)\n\nQuote: "The meter was originally defined as one ten-millionth (0.0000001 or 10-7) of the distance, as measured over the earth's surface in a great circle passing through Paris, France, from the geographic north pole to the equator. "\n\nNowadays, the meter, the gram and other units are defined using systems that are independent of the geography (eg: 1 meter is the distance traveled by a ray of electromagnetic (EM) energy through a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 (3.33564095 x 10-9) of a second).\n\n\nI hope you find this helpful,\n\nSincerely,\n\nManuel-(block)-Cachilapex
51653
America adopted it's gallon from the British wine gallon during a time when there was more than one kind of gallon. In 1824 The British adopted the "imperial gallon" as their standard gallon. Pints vary accordingly.
621287
International System of units\n\nfor length its the meter