2003-03-07 Terry,
You have to understand that the UK, Ireland and Canada all have official "weights and measures acts" as part of their laws. The US has no such thing. For this reason there are no legal or official definitions. Someone at one time established some definitions and everyone sort of follows them. That is why the system here is called "customary". You can define any unit the way you want to. The problem is getting others to accept and use your unit. So, if you are looking for "true", "legal", you are wasting your time. They don't exist. John ----- Original Message ----- From: "Terry Simpson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Friday, 2003-03-07 14:53 Subject: [USMA:25057] Re: USMA digest 1201 >Of Joseph B. Reid >>I simply wanted a single US legal source for the basic non-metric >>definitions as I can with Canada, Ireland, and UK. It could have 42 >decimal >places for all I care, as long as it is the definitive legal definition > >I suggest that you use NIST Special Publication 811, Guide for the >Use of the International System of Units (SI). Thanks. I was not aware that it had so many US non-metric units in there. It will be useful. However, it clearly cannot be used for a true legal definition because it has rounded off some of the unit values.
