Best 4x4 for rural / remote living - UK

[Martyn]

That's also why our GI canteens are smaller than the British ones (our quart is smaller)

The "cup" as a unit of measurement is hardly ever used here - never has been really. We used to use pints, half pints etc. Our canteen is a 1 litre canteen, which is only a little bigger than a US quart (1 US Quart = 943 mls). Fluids are traded in litres here and have been for a long time. People talk about mpg, but it's nostalgia, you cant buy a gallon of anything from anywhere - with the singular exception of beer, which by law must be sold in imperial measures. We resisted metrication, but it's inevitable. The US will go metric too eventually. It doesnt make sense in a global market to have multiple units for weights and measures and the metric system is much simpler and more logical. You get used to it eventually.

 

[santaman2000]

The "cup" as a unit of measurement is hardly ever used here - never has been really. We used to use pints, half pints etc. Our canteen is a 1 litre canteen, which is only a little bigger than a US quart (1 US Quart = 943 mls). Fluids are traded in litres here and have been for a long time. People talk about mpg, but it's nostalgia, you cant buy a gallon of anything from anywhere - with the singular exception of beer, which by law must be sold in imperial measures. We resisted metrication, but it's inevitable. The US will go metric too eventually. It doesnt make sense in a global market to have multiple units for weights and measures and the metric system is much simpler and more logical. You get used to it eventually.

Yeah, even back in the mid to late 1980s when I was stationed there petrol was sold by the liter. I remember beer and cider being sold by the pint or half pint as well.

I know your current canteen is 1 liter but I thought I had gathered from other threads here that the older ones (58 pattern, i.e.) were an Imperial quart?

Oddly you're the reason we're NOT on the metric system. Originally the first congress back in 1787 wanted to adopt the metric system but as Great Britain was still our primary trading partner, they opted to stay on the Imperial system. As I said though, I don't know why or when the drift to the smaller cup (half pint) occurred. And BTW I did see a few cookbooks over there using the cup as a measurement.

Even though we're technically NOT metric there are some items here that are sold only in metric. Soft drinks (Coke, Pepsi, etc) still come in 12 ounce cans or (20 ounce bottles which are relatively recent) but the larger sizes are only come in 2 liter sized bottles. Spirits have long ago gone metric. Electric motors are an eclectic mix; sometimes you'll find them rated in watts and sometimes in horsepower.

 

[Martyn]

Yeah, even back in the mid to late 1980s when I was stationed there petrol was sold by the liter. I remember beer and cider being sold by the pint or half pint as well.

I know your current canteen is 1 liter but I thought I had gathered from other threads here that the older ones (58 pattern, i.e.) were an Imperial quart?

Oddly you're the reason we're NOT on the metric system. Originally the first congress back in 1787 wanted to adopt the metric system but as Great Britain was still our primary trading partner, they opted to stay on the Imperial system. As I said though, I don't know why or when the drift to the smaller cup (half pint) occurred. And BTW I did see a few cookbooks over there using the cup as a measurement.

Even though we're technically NOT metric there are some items here that are sold only in metric. Soft drinks (Coke, Pepsi, etc) still come in 12 ounce cans or (20 ounce bottles which are relatively recent) but the larger sizes are only come in 2 liter sized bottles. Spirits have long ago gone metric. Electric motors are an eclectic mix; sometimes you'll find them rated in watts and sometimes in horsepower.

I think 1965 we started to "go metric" but it's far from complete yet. Some things have been in place for a long time, I dont think anyone uses or even thinks of temperature in Fahrenheit any more and it's definitely much more logical to have the freezing point of pure water at sea level set at 0 degrees and the boiling point set at 100 degrees. But some things, like the "pint of beer" are so culturally engrained, I dont know what it would take to move it over. I think probably the next big change for us will be changing our road speed limits over to kph from mph.

 

[Martyn]

£25,000!!!! For a 12 year old cut and shut with no sign of an engineers report!?

They seriously need to put down the crack pipe.

Yeah, it is a bit optimistic isn't it - you could buy an Airstream caravan for that.

 

[Martyn]

And BTW I did see a few cookbooks over there using the cup as a measurement.

Old cookbooks and recipes are probably the only place you'll see it in the UK. It exists, it was just never commonly used outside of measuring ingredients for cakes and such. Same with a quart, it exists here, but you'll almost never hear the term used and in most shops, if you asked for a quart of something, they'd look at you like you were from Mars. Asking for two pints gets the required amount. It's just expressions.

The '58 pattern bottle and mug is the current issue and is I believe, 1 litre for the bottle and 500mls for the mug, which is only a few mls larger than your 1 US pint mug and 1 US quart canteen (which I vastly prefer BTW). Although 1960 (the '58 pat webbing was introduced in '60) was a bit early for us, it was probably standardised at a litre to comply with NATO or possibly in anticipation of our looming metrication in '65.

I'm not certain, but I think you'd have to go back to the '44 webbing to find a UK "pint" water bottle, though I dunno what the capacity actually was.

 

[British Red]

I dont think anyone uses or even thinks of temperature in Fahrenheit any more

I do - and my parents (who are still alive!). A nice warm summers day is 70, 60 is cool 80 is warm. Normal body temperature is 98.4

I also think in feet and inches (a six foot tall man makes sense to me), stone, pounds (a bag of sugar is still a two pound bag to me) and ounces ( a quarter of sherbert lemons please ). Distances are in miles, yards etc.

Certainly still think about a four pint or two pint jug of milk (whatever the packet says), I think a supermarket sized bag of spuds is a 5lb bag, my jerry cans are five gallons.

Some US measurements don't work for me though - a bottle of scotch is a bottle not a "fifth".

I can think in metric liquids, I really struggle with weights and distances though - I still mentally convert.

I'm probably the last generation that will think like that - my daughter doesn't and she is in her twenties.

And I do have a set of measuring cups - graduated in cups - but they are solely for cooking as you say!

 

[santaman2000]

...Some US measurements don't work for me though - a bottle of scotch is a bottle not a "fifth".

LOL. before metrification a "fifth" referred to the size of the bottle.

They came in: half pints, pints (both shaped as hip flasks), fifths (1 fifth of a gallon), and quarts.
Now they are metric: 250 mL, 500mL (still in the old hip flask shape), 750 mL (close to a fifth), 1 liter; and now a big 1.75 liter.

 

[santaman2000]

Old cookbooks and recipes are probably the only place you'll see it in the UK. It exists, it was just never commonly used outside of measuring ingredients for cakes and such...

Same with a quart, it exists here, but you'll almost never hear the term used and in most shops, if you asked for a quart of something, they'd look at you like you were from Mars. Asking for two pints gets the required amount. It's just expressions.

I don't think I've ever seen the cup used here either outside of cooking or food measurement.

It's ironic that when I was growing up you could go to the grocery store and certain fresh deli items that they dished into tubs upon order (such as potato salad, cole slaw, etc.) were ordered by pints or quarts. Now they're ordered by the pound. I can look at a container of a given size (whether it be a pint or 500 mL) and tell about how many people it will feed, but I have absolutely no idea how big a container holds a pound (or half pound, or whatever) of potato salad.

Quarts were (and are) the common measure for automotive fluids/lubricants (other than fuel) such as oil, transmission (gearbox) fluid, power steering fluid, brake fluid, etc. (That should bring us back to 4WD vehicles) Seems like we've strayed a bit.

 

[British Red]

Yep, but here we have bottles, half bottles and quarter bottles. You can buy a litre though. Which is a litre! A bottle is 750ml but you would ask for "a half bottle" not 375ml

Its like bores. A 12 bore makes sense - it isn't a 12 gauge - there is no guage in any system of measurement that it corresponsds to. Although why a .410 is a .410 I don't know - maybe it didn't exist in black powder days?

 

[British Red]

Ooops back to engines - they are measured in metric (e.g. a 3 litre engine!)

 

[Martyn]

Ooops back to engines - they are measured in metric (e.g. a 3 litre engine!)

...and have been for a long time. I cant personally recall engine sizes being measured in any other way. I remember my dad having a Rover P5 made sometime in the 50's and it had a 3 "litre" engine.

 

[forestwalker]

I don't know why or when the drift to the smaller cup (half pint) occurred. And BTW I did see a few cookbooks over there using the cup as a measurement.

IIRC you guys are still using an older gallon (the old wine gallon?), while the UK modernized at some point to a different gallon.

 

[Fizzy]

Perhaps when we sold goods to the US, back in the day, we told them they were buying a gallon, and we were actually short changing them?

 

[santaman2000]

...and have been for a long time. I cant personally recall engine sizes being measured in any other way. I remember my dad having a Rover P5 made sometime in the 50's and it had a 3 "litre" engine.

Don't know when you switched over there but they used to be measured in cubic inch displacement. Over here the switch was in the late 70s or so.

 

[santaman2000]

Perhaps when we sold goods to the US, back in the day, we told them they were buying a gallon, and we were actually short changing them?

LOL. Possibly so. But as I said the pint here is only 16 ounces as well.

 

[TeeDee]

"Best 4x4 for rural / remote living - UK"

http://babyanimalz.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/baby-donkey-mom.jpg

 

[pteron]

I was told (possibly apocryphally) that the reason the US pint is smaller than the UK pint is down to the fact that one of our kings wanted to tax the colonials more but they wouldn't have it. So he kept the tax the same but shrank the size of the beer pint.

Re cubic inches vs litres for engines, aviation engines are still generally referred to in cu inches. Ours has an 0-320 which is 320 cu inches, i.e. just over 5 litres.

 

[Imagedude]

I'm tempted by this

http://www.neneoverland.co.uk/4x4defender90_used/used4x4defender90RRJEEP.htm

 

[santaman2000]

I was told (possibly apocryphally) that the reason the US pint is smaller than the UK pint is down to the fact that one of our kings wanted to tax the colonials more but they wouldn't have it. So he kept the tax the same but shrank the size of the beer pint...

Kinda like the manufactures have been doing to packaged goods for the last 15-20 years. Goods that used to come in 1 pound bags (like coffee grounds and packaged bacon) are now 12 ounces and where a case of Coke (or beer for that matter) used to be 4 six packs (24 cans) now it's only 20 cans. But in all cases the price remained the same (or rose)

 

[fredster]

...can't break Toyota's, they drive 4X4's into the ground but the Toyota out lives them all. So, performance, price and reliability I too would go for a Toyota...

Wise words. have had a few mates with Defender's, massively problematic. I remember once in Land Rover Owner mag I read the line "and what would any day out in a Landy be without a mechanical issue to deal with" - 'nuff said!

Hilux the whole way. Unbreakable, with car like comfort levels.