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Imperial measurements was "Crossrail budget may be slashed by a third"
On Mon, 31 May 2010 17:22:55 +0100, Bill Borland put finger to keyboard and
typed: In article .com, bob writes One American gallon: 3.785 litres One Imperial gallon: 4.546 litres The difference stems not from the difference in gallons, but from the two different definitions of the pint. The Imperial pint is 20 Fl Oz, while the US pint is only 16. From that basis, the quart and the gallon are each defined in the same way with respect to their relevant pints. And the original reason for *that* is that the British pint was originally the space occupied by one pound of dried peas (God knows why) whereas the US pint was defined as the space occupied by one pound of water, which seemed to be a more accurately reproducible quantity. Not peas, and it's the other way round, actually - the Imperial pint is the more logical one. A pint has always been 1/8 of a gallon, but there were traditionally different gallons for different substances. A US pint is derived from the British wine gallon, which was defined in 1701 as 231 - so it was current at the time of US independence. However, in 1824 the British government abolished all the previous different gallons and replaced them with one defined as the volume of ten pounds of distilled water at 62 degrees F. So the Imperial pint, despite not being a pound of water (it's 1.25 pounds of water) is the one based on a defined, reproducible standard. For fairly obvious reasons, the by then independent USA didn't follow the British lead, and stuck with a gallon (and hence a pint) based on a measurement that the British abolished. A US pint isn't actually a pound of water, anyway - it's just over a pound (1.04375 pounds, to be precise) and has no relationship to the weight of water anywhere in its definition. The fact that it happens to be approximately a pound is pure coincidence. Mark -- Blog: http://mark.goodge.co.uk Stuff: http://www.good-stuff.co.uk |
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Imperial measurements was "Crossrail budget may be slashed by a third"
On Mon, 31 May 2010 19:23:41 +0100, I put finger to keyboard and typed:
Not peas, and it's the other way round, actually - the Imperial pint is the more logical one. A pint has always been 1/8 of a gallon, but there were traditionally different gallons for different substances. A US pint is derived from the British wine gallon, which was defined in 1701 as 231 - so it was current at the time of US independence. That's 231 cubic inches, of course. Dunno how that got left out of the previous post. Mark -- Blog: http://mark.goodge.co.uk Stuff: http://www.good-stuff.co.uk |
#3
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Imperial measurements was "Crossrail budget may be slashed by a third"
Mark Goodge wrote:
On Mon, 31 May 2010 17:22:55 +0100, Bill Borland put finger to keyboard and typed: In article .com, bob writes One American gallon: 3.785 litres One Imperial gallon: 4.546 litres The difference stems not from the difference in gallons, but from the two different definitions of the pint. The Imperial pint is 20 Fl Oz, while the US pint is only 16. From that basis, the quart and the gallon are each defined in the same way with respect to their relevant pints. And the original reason for *that* is that the British pint was originally the space occupied by one pound of dried peas (God knows why) whereas the US pint was defined as the space occupied by one pound of water, which seemed to be a more accurately reproducible quantity. Not peas, and it's the other way round, actually - the Imperial pint is the more logical one. A pint has always been 1/8 of a gallon, but there were traditionally different gallons for different substances. .... that for the head being the smallest of them all, if ten gallon hats are anything to go by. ;-) -- http://gallery120232.fotopic.net/p11938592.html ("Toffee apple" 31 017 at Colchester, 16 Apr 1980) |
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