YARD NOT THIRTY-SIX INCHES.

Matamata Record, Volume XIV, Issue 1193, 5 February 1931, Page 8

YARD NOT THIRTY-SIX INCHES.

REALLY A LITTLE SHORTER. What is a yard ? Ask the first man you meet, and he will tell you: “36 inches.” But the Imperial Conference says it is not so simple. A report on standardisation which has just been approved says: “It is not always realised that the Imperial yard is not an absolute standard, but is the distance, at 62 degrees Fahrenheit, between two marks on a bar of bronze preserved at Westminster.” The Conference has brought to light : a discovery (comments the Loh-;som;News-Chronicle). The yard is ■no longer what it was.

There* 1 is reason to believe,” says the report “that the standard yard is about 2-10,000ths of an inch shorter than when it was originally constructed about 80 years ago.” i The reference standards used by inspectors of weights and measures all over the United Kingdom are adjusted by periodical comparisons with copies of their standard. For ordinary purposes these copies do not vary, but minute changes take place over a period of years which are of significance in the exact measurements needed in modern manufacfacturing practice. The report recommends that each dominion and India should be provided with a refeernce standard of each unit or measurement.