Bert06

Member

Registered: 1 Sep 2019

Posts: 2

New builder - Inches to mm conversion

Morning,
So plans opened, excited, confronted with the devils own measurement INCHES. I’m English, living in Brittany, nearly 52, and looking at my beautiful boat plans covered in imperial hyroglyphs - truly The Dark Side)  I was a metric D&T woodwork teacher. Inches, my height apart are a mystery... The blessed plans for my skiff are American, they don’t even use A4 paper (297 x 210MM)

What’s the best way to convert to a usable (left handed born in the late 60s) measure. Transom is 24 15/16 becomes 633.41mm. Happy to soend hours converting but...

How accurate does one have to be?

DerekD

Member

Registered: 12 Aug 2013

Posts: 33

Re: New builder - Inches to mm conversion

Strangely I measure big stuff in feet but switch to millimetres for detail.

You say that the transom is 24 15/16.
I'd say it was 25 which is 635mm

In my experience symmetry is more important than critical measurements. As long as you are consistent with you conversions  i.e. don't round up one part and round down the other you should be ok.

I have to say that the "foot" "inches" and "eighths" used for lofting is amazingly simple but having said that when I built my boat using David Nichols plans his guidance was to "eyeball" the gunwale for the best line. So even after following all the measurements you are left with a flexible decision to achieve a nice line.

Enjoy your project

Bert06

Member

Registered: 1 Sep 2019

Posts: 2

Re: New builder - Inches to mm conversion

Cheers, thanks for the tips. I didn’t want to mess up from the first cut.

I’ll make sure I’m consistent. Feet and inches are great for guessing sizes, but I work in my. Time to go buy some contraplaque marine...

Yambo

Member

Registered: 17 Jul 2014

Posts: 36

Re: New builder - Inches to mm conversion

I habitually go through the plans and manual and change everything to millimetres - I set the memory function on my calculator to 25.4 and simply tap in (inches) x MR and pencil the result onto the plans.

I think that it's always good to read through manuals first and have a good look over the plans. I just kill 2 birds with one stone as it were.