Metric vs. other measurement systems - chart

**Unkle Fuzzy** · Aug 11, 2020, 11:47 AM

The chain got me to thinking about Rods. I 330ft rolls of cattle fencing and that roll is also listed as 1 Rod turns out that 1 Rod equals 500 Links....

**mklotz** · Aug 11, 2020, 12:15 PM

Originally Posted by Unkle Fuzzy

The chain got me to thinking about Rods. I 330ft rolls of cattle fencing and that roll is also listed as 1 Rod turns out that 1 Rod equals 500 Links....

Hmm, this quote from Wikipedia seems to contradict that...

The rod or perch or pole (sometimes also lug) is a surveyor's tool[1] and unit of length of various historical definitions, often between 3 and 8 meters. In modern US customary units it is defined as 16 1⁄2 US survey feet, equal to exactly 1⁄320 of a surveyor's mile, or a quarter of a surveyor's chain, and is approximately 5.0292 meters.

At 16.5 feet, a rod would be 16.5/0.66 = 25 links, a quarter of a surveyor's chain.

**Philip Davies** · Mar 25, 2021, 12:37 PM

Cubits. That’s what we should be using. Yes, indeed.

**Unkle Fuzzy** · Aug 11, 2020, 02:25 PM

Ooops, My mistake, a roll of fencing is 20 Rods not 1.

Been a while since I read that label.

**jatt** · Aug 11, 2020, 08:31 PM

Yeah a lot of those old measurements make my head spin a bit.

Got my metric and as required - imperial.

Should'nt have bought a Seventies pommy tractor - prob Whitworth. So far, so good with my spanner and socket selection.

**IntheGroove** · Aug 11, 2020, 08:40 PM

My Norton 650 Atlas was Whitworth. Snap-On still sells Whitworth tools...

**Nick79** · Aug 16, 2020, 11:22 AM

What ever happened to the "Rule of thumb"?

**Karl_H** · Aug 16, 2020, 11:46 AM

"Rule of Thumb" has falsely been tied to to notion it is OK to beat your wife if your sick is smaller than your thumb, thus most of us don't use the phrase any more.

**Jon** · Aug 17, 2020, 11:52 AM

Teaching children to avoid measurement systems.

**mklotz** · Aug 17, 2020, 12:01 PM

Don't laugh. There's probably a course in teacher's colleges where future teachers are taught how to convert feet to bicycles and pounds to hamburgers.

We're well into the third generation of the dumbing down of the population. Soon folks will have to go to a scribe to have something read to them or written for them. The elite scribes will be able to do simple sums (but no division) for their clients.