"How the EU works: In Germany, they make the rules, in Britain, theyobey the rules, in France, they bend the rules, in Spain, they break therules, and in Italy they have no rules at all."

On Sun, 20 Nov 2011 10:42:16 +0100, Martin wrote in post :
:

Odd that you didn't show your independence by adopting the metric
system :-)

grin
--
Tim C.

On 11/22/2011 05:04 AM, Dan Stephenson wrote:
On 2011-11-21 04:37:49 -0600, Tom P said:

On 11/19/2011 02:19 AM, Dan Stephenson wrote:
On 2011-11-14 14:16:48 -0600, Jean said:


in Britain they willingly create confusion (pounds, feets, oz, driving
at the left),


I think driving on the left is really great. I'm right-handed, and I can
use right-hand to steer but shift with my left. And as I love
scenic-driving in Britain and Ireland, it is incredibly helpful to point
my camera out the window with the right hand (my camera of the style
that is meant to be held and 80% operated with the right hand). I just
wish Norway hadn't gone over to driving on the right for my drive up the
fjordlands to the Nordkapp a couple years back.

Norway? Wasn't that Sweden over forty years ago?

Sorry, that's right, I mis-remembered.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagen_H

That is crazy. Love the photo. Interesting, too, however it was defeated
in a referendum in 1955 but in 1963 the parliament gave a big Screw You
to the public and made it happen anyway.



some interesting history he
http://users.telenet.be/worldstandar...the%20left.htm

Now that is really interesting, thanks!



Some more really surprising facts - traffic drives on the left in the
U.S. Virgin Islands. And the United States bought St. Thomas, St. John
St. Croix off Denmark in 1916.
Maybe there's a precedent for the Greeks selling off a few islands?

On Mon, 21 Nov 2011 21:46:49 -0600, Dan Stephenson
wrote:
On 2011-11-21 04:42:47 -0600, Jesper Lauridsen said:
On 20 Nov., 16:17, Dan Stephenson wrote:




This is the interchange nearest to my house:




http://g.co/maps/3kvfx




How does that differ from say: http://g.co/maps/957mj ?




That looks really interesting! Actually, most of the interchanges
on
the motorways in Britain involve huge roundabouts that have traffic
lights on them. There was one particularly crazy roundabout, in
Swindon, iirc, that had planetary roundabouts on the perimeters of
an
anti-clockwide central roundabout.

But that's not on a motorway. I suspect the roundabouts you mention,
are part of the off ramp system, and not interchanges.


You link above looks like a roundaboutish variation on the "clover
leaf" method of traffic control. The downside on it, however, is
that
traffic has crossing.

I don't think this intersection has any crossings. It's merging only,
and no weaving (unless you want to do a 180).

I picked this one at random - zoomed in on London and looked for a
motorway intersection. I don't know how typical it is.

On Mon, 21 Nov 2011 10:18:14 +0100, Martin wrote:

On Mon, 21 Nov 2011 05:03:36 +0000 (UTC), David Hatunen
wrote:

On Sun, 20 Nov 2011 10:59:44 +0100, Wolfgang Schwanke wrote:

Dan Stephenson wrote in
news:2011111920582317173-stephedanospam@maccom:

That continental Europe needed reform 200 years ago, and the United
Kingdom and the United States did not?

"Need" is the wrong word. We could have kept the old measurements and
we'd have survived. They just make life easier. They help you to pass
physics tests too.

When I was taking high school and college physics in the early 1950s
they were taught in pound-second-feet.

I must say, I feel an affinity for Britain and the Britons.

Same, but not everything they do is right. Besides Britain has been
officially metric (or really SI) for decades.

Officially, the USA has been metric since the last half of the
nineteenth century.

and you still use Fahrenheight???

Strictly speaking, a degree of temperature, fahrenheit of centigrade/
celsius, isn't really a metric unit, save by the convention of ding
adopted as one. There is no direct link between a degree of temperature,
F or C, and other units in a system of weights and measures. At least not
in the sense that one litre is the volume of a one kilogram mass of water
(which it wasn't quite, in fact, until SI did away with the liter as a
primary unit. Decades ago I used to win bar bets betting that the
millilitre and the cubic centimeter were not the same.

It would have made little difference to the utility of the metric system
had they adopted the fahrenheit scale instead of the centigrade scale.

--
Dave Hatunen, Tucson, Baja Arizona

In article ,
lid says...

On Mon, 21 Nov 2011 11:37:49 +0100, Tom P wrote:

On 11/19/2011 02:19 AM, Dan Stephenson wrote:
On 2011-11-14 14:16:48 -0600, Jean said:


in Britain they willingly create confusion (pounds, feets, oz, driving
at the left),


I think driving on the left is really great. I'm right-handed, and I can
use right-hand to steer but shift with my left.

Unless you have a health problem steering with the left hand and
changing gear with the right hand is easier for right handed drivers.
Gear changing requires more manual dexterity than holding a wheel.

Right-handed guitarists do the most intense finger work with their left
hand on the frets/strings - the right hand is merely used to strum/pick
at strings.

In article 2011112122111821660-stephedanospam@maccom,
says...


Anyway - for me, I like the right-sided orientation. I was SO SCARED
when I first tried it. All the rental place has was Nissan Almera - a
rather large car

It's nothing of the sort. It's a small family car.

David Hatunen writes:

On Mon, 21 Nov 2011 10:18:14 +0100, Martin wrote:

On Mon, 21 Nov 2011 05:03:36 +0000 (UTC), David Hatunen
wrote:

On Sun, 20 Nov 2011 10:59:44 +0100, Wolfgang Schwanke wrote:

Dan Stephenson wrote in
news:2011111920582317173-stephedanospam@maccom:

That continental Europe needed reform 200 years ago, and the United
Kingdom and the United States did not?

"Need" is the wrong word. We could have kept the old measurements and
we'd have survived. They just make life easier. They help you to pass
physics tests too.

When I was taking high school and college physics in the early 1950s
they were taught in pound-second-feet.

I must say, I feel an affinity for Britain and the Britons.

Same, but not everything they do is right. Besides Britain has been
officially metric (or really SI) for decades.

Officially, the USA has been metric since the last half of the
nineteenth century.

and you still use Fahrenheight???

Strictly speaking, a degree of temperature, fahrenheit of centigrade/
celsius, isn't really a metric unit, save by the convention of ding
adopted as one. There is no direct link between a degree of temperature,
F or C, and other units in a system of weights and measures.

One gram calorie is the energy needed to raise one gram of water by
one degree C. (Thus 100 calories to go from freezing to boiling.)

Of course one could have defined a calorie based on degrees F instead
I suppose (making it 180 calories to go from freezing to bioling) but
the point is that it is linked into the system, even if degrees F
could have been linked in instead.

in the sense that one litre is the volume of a one kilogram mass of water
(which it wasn't quite, in fact, until SI did away with the liter as a
primary unit. Decades ago I used to win bar bets betting that the
millilitre and the cubic centimeter were not the same.

It would have made little difference to the utility of the metric system
had they adopted the fahrenheit scale instead of the centigrade
scale.

Yes, little difference. Some though. That pesky 180 instead of a
100, but I can't imagine that matters very much. Still, I find it
psychologically easier to think of a calorie getting you 1/100 of the
way from freezing to boiling rather than 1/180.

Or one can simply use joules (about 4.1858 required to heat a gram of
water by 1 degrees C and about 2.325 to heat a gram of water 1 degree F).

On 2011-11-22 09:52:24 -0600, Tom P said:

On 11/21/2011 03:30 PM, William Black wrote:
On 21/11/11 11:06, Tom P wrote:


Incidentally, plumbing fittings in Germany are sold in imperial units -
half-inch. three-quarter inch etc.

I suspect this may be true in many countries in Europe.

Of course they are, in much the same way that almost all firearms and
artillery use imperial measurements transferred to metric.

7.62mm = .30 (the almost universal rifle calibre)

9mm = .36 (Which actually started with the old 'cap and ball' Colt pistol)

37mm = inch and a half (Maxim's 'light pompom' calibre)

55mm = two inches (Maxim's 'heavy pompom' calibre)

155mm = six inches (British naval gun size)

But everyone pretends they're not really imperial measurements...

What's really interesting is that British medium naval guns were 4.7
inches, which is 120mm...


and .303 is presumably 8mm?

Well, .303 * 25.4 mm = 7.696 mm. The "8mm Mauser" is actually 7.92 mm,
which is about .31 caliber. It is in the "30 cal" class.

--
Dan Stephenson
http://web.mac.com/stepheda
Travel pages for Europe and the U.S.A. (and New Zealand too)

Fascinating and on topic, of course.

"Dan Stephenson" a écrit dans le message de groupe de discussion :
2011112222370557117-stephedanospam@maccom...

On 2011-11-22 09:52:24 -0600, Tom P said:

On 11/21/2011 03:30 PM, William Black wrote:
On 21/11/11 11:06, Tom P wrote:


Incidentally, plumbing fittings in Germany are sold in imperial units -
half-inch. three-quarter inch etc.

I suspect this may be true in many countries in Europe.

Of course they are, in much the same way that almost all firearms and
artillery use imperial measurements transferred to metric.

7.62mm = .30 (the almost universal rifle calibre)

9mm = .36 (Which actually started with the old 'cap and ball' Colt
pistol)

37mm = inch and a half (Maxim's 'light pompom' calibre)

55mm = two inches (Maxim's 'heavy pompom' calibre)

155mm = six inches (British naval gun size)

But everyone pretends they're not really imperial measurements...

What's really interesting is that British medium naval guns were 4.7
inches, which is 120mm...


and .303 is presumably 8mm?

Well, .303 * 25.4 mm = 7.696 mm. The "8mm Mauser" is actually 7.92 mm,
which is about .31 caliber. It is in the "30 cal" class.

--
Dan Stephenson
http://web.mac.com/stepheda
Travel pages for Europe and the U.S.A. (and New Zealand too)

utterly fascinating indeed.
The stoopid drive on the left with the steering wheel on the left.
Americans of course...

"Tom P" a écrit dans le message de groupe de discussion :
...

On 11/22/2011 05:04 AM, Dan Stephenson wrote:
On 2011-11-21 04:37:49 -0600, Tom P said:

On 11/19/2011 02:19 AM, Dan Stephenson wrote:
On 2011-11-14 14:16:48 -0600, Jean said:


in Britain they willingly create confusion (pounds, feets, oz, driving
at the left),


I think driving on the left is really great. I'm right-handed, and I can
use right-hand to steer but shift with my left. And as I love
scenic-driving in Britain and Ireland, it is incredibly helpful to point
my camera out the window with the right hand (my camera of the style
that is meant to be held and 80% operated with the right hand). I just
wish Norway hadn't gone over to driving on the right for my drive up the
fjordlands to the Nordkapp a couple years back.

Norway? Wasn't that Sweden over forty years ago?

Sorry, that's right, I mis-remembered.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagen_H

That is crazy. Love the photo. Interesting, too, however it was defeated
in a referendum in 1955 but in 1963 the parliament gave a big Screw You
to the public and made it happen anyway.



some interesting history he
http://users.telenet.be/worldstandar...the%20left.htm

Now that is really interesting, thanks!



Some more really surprising facts - traffic drives on the left in the
U.S. Virgin Islands. And the United States bought St. Thomas, St. John
St. Croix off Denmark in 1916.
Maybe there's a precedent for the Greeks selling off a few islands?