Here's a quick video that puts thousandths of a inch into terms most people can relate to and shows what a difference a thousandth (.001") can make with the fit of parts.
Great demonstration. The reamed holes and gage pin were particularly illustrative. I'm glad you've started doing these videos, as your knowledge and hair were previously known only to a few, and clearly the world was a darker place for it.
Great explanation,,,a light went off in my head,,,been a home builder all my life dealing in fraction and decimals and just bought a metal lathe and dealing with micrometers and calipers,,, and you helped me more then you know.
My friend is my gun smith, he is always on a lathe or using a CNC machine, and I watched your instructions and using the tools to measure for my own edification, interesting, Thanks.
I just got hired to be a machine operator in a place that makes fan blades for jet engines with as tight as 1/10 of a thousandth of an inch. I have never done anything like it. I have struggled with the math and your video actually helps.
Thanks for this. I work in printing and had a customer want to move something by .006" and I was trying to find something to explain to them how absolutely small that is. "The thickness of a sheet of copy paper" is definitely close enough to illustrate my point.
I believe this is all correct: Notes from video: 1/64 inch = .015625 inches AKA Between 15 & 16 thousandth of an inch Loose fit for a bearing or a shaft in machining Standard paper is .004 inches Four thousandth of an inch Most human hair is .004 -.005 inches Four to five thousandths of an inch One thousandth of an inch (.001 inches) (Metric) = .0254 mm 1/4 inch = .250 inches (1 divided by 4 you get .25) AKA Two hundred & fifty thousandth of an inch 3/8 = .375 inches Three hundred & seventy five thousandths of an inch 3/16 = .1875 inches AKA one hundred eighty seven thousandths & five tenths To get your decimal equivalent for your fraction, you divide your top number (Numerator) by the bottom number (Denominator)
I measured a bullet casing and found the wall thickness to be .010" and thought, "Ten thousands of an inch sounds really small, but looks much bigger, visually. So, I wanted to know exactly what.001" of an inch looks like, and your video was THE ONLY video on YT that would show me, and I think you did an outstanding job at explaining and showing exactly that. So, thank you. Excellent video, Sir.
Thanks Justin. I'm honestly surprised that a casing is only .010" thick, you know, because of the whole explosion coming out of it and all. I guess it depends on the caliber too.
Great video, the only improvement that might be added is to identify the place values to the right of the decimal point. Tens, hundreds, thousands, ECT. Again superb video.😎
I’m from the uk but server my time in an American engine company. I was taught the imperial system of measurement and still measure things in feet and inches. The thing that I could never understand was if the imperial system for feet and inches is based on 12 why isn’t the division of the inch the same. Why does it rely on the decimal system? I know the answer it’s cause it’s easier to work out. Decimal is so much easier to work with but legacy measuring has not moved on. The reason we still use the mile here and not KM.
Thanks for the Vid. Powerful stuff with the dowel and the three bores. Would have been nice if there was an example of a common item that is .001 to use as a gap measurement tool. And of course this Vid has the most vital point of information I've seen on these info-Vids and that being how wonderfully wavy your hair is. Outstanding! (Has anyone seen George Burns recently? Where is he when you need him? Oh, everywhere; he's God, I forgot)-cigar
how thick or slim is .056 thou of a second, how would I translate this to measurements of length? , its the margin from 2nd place I won my race at Brands hatch in a Clio cup car. It was so close on the line a pic had to be taken
What is a good way (or just a simple way) to remember the fraction to decimal conversions? Specifically the 8th's and 16th's. I'm expected to remember them off the top of my head, and I can't find a way to make them stick.. I keep forgetting them, or getting them mixed up. I know its a .0625 difference between them. example: 1/8 is only .0625 smaller than 3/16. Next is 1/4. Only reason I know that is because I have a table in front of me now..
Repetition is key. Maybe try making some flash cards to help you. Start with the 8ths and quarters. Those are easy. Then move on to the 16ths. If you can remember those you're set because you can just add or subtract .03125 to get the 32nds. Also, if you're unsure if 5/32 is bigger or smaller than 3/16, convert 3/16 to 6/32 and you have your answer. I hope this helps! Let me know if you're still having trouble.
Great explanation. I have been researching the experiments being conducted using BECs as a way of achieving absolute zero in a laboratory setting. The "cloud" of atoms being used measures 1/1000th of an inch in diameter. I am still puzzled how something this small can actually have room for a measuring device that can determine the temperature that is so close to absolute zero.
Stuart, A lot of people including me, might possibly be somewhat confused on a .0005 dial indicator, particularly a test indicator, and also a surface grinder too!! We beseech, and implore you, to please educate and hopefully make this clear as mud, to all of us!! We are all counting on you Stuart. After all you are the man!! We really enjoy all your videos too!! Nelson White
@@StuartdeHaro Thank you Stuart for your quick response. Most dial indicators particularly the imports are showing 10 digits; to the five ten thousandth mark?? So in my way of thinking the first mark would equate to 0.00005 five hundred ten thousands of an inch?? Second mark would equate to 0.00025 of an inch?? And so on. Some people on RU-vid, are possibly giving incorrect information, confusing the whole subject. To make matters even worse, some now are talking millionths, and microns. If you would please, shed some light on this now confusing subject. Here’s an example for you…. Mitutoyo 2776S Dial Indicator. P. S. Tried to include photo but, wouldn’t let me, which I know you don’t need!! Thank you in advance Stuart!!
@@nelsonwhite6980 I put out a video on indicators that hopefully clears things up for you, although reading your edited comments, I'm not sure. Let me know. Here's the link: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-fq0HDiawnp8.html
If your pin is 0.2500”, what should the hole normally be for a good fit that allows the pin to move, but without significant wobble? You would want enough room for a layer of light oil, perhaps.
It depends a lot on the length of contact. If the hole is in thinner stock like in this video, you can get away with a tighter fit. If you had a thicker part with everything else being the same, you might find there was too much interference. You'd probably still only be talking a half thou or a thou, more if you went with a bigger diameter.
What helps me the most to be able to actually visualize what the "jumbo mumbo thousandths" really is in physical dimension, is that I know 1 thou is 25 microns, and there is 1000 microns in a millimeter. So 5 thou can quickly visualized in my mind to "a little over a 10th of a millimeter". Or 20 thou (20x25uM=500uM) half a millimeter. I think most people can visualize a millimeter pretty well. I can not immediately make sense or visualize 0.040". But I know 40 x 25 is 1000.... or 1 millimeter...
Thank you Stuart, great explanation & demonstration I am a carpenter and your right a 64th is accepted in general on most projects. Unless of course your crafting 🎶 musical instruments etc.. However I'm redesigning a new line of weed trimmer heads and I'm one that learns best from visual forms of teaching. This will be etched in my mind for a long time.🙂 Thanks for taking your time to share. From the 63 year old carpenter ☝️
Dale of Metal Tips and Tricks demonstrated .001" by equating a 10ft 2x4 to 1". Cutting off a foot demos 0.1". Cutting off 1.2" of that demos 0.01", and so on.
Think about this...if you have a globe of the world that is 39 mm in diameter then the international space station, which averages 250 miles from earth is only 1 mm from the surface of the globe. If you assume that over 90 percent of our atmosphere is below 10 miles from surface, then the thickness of our atmosphere is 1/25 mm or .000157 inches. Or in other words on the scale of a 30 mm globe our atmosphere is less thick than the thickness of tht varnish on the globe. This fact alone has made me believe in the potential for global warming more than any other stastic.
I don't think I would want to. If my hair gets any more body it might become self-aware and take over the world. It seems innocent enough, but I can tell it's just biding its time and polishing its jackboots so it looks good with its foot on your throat. Trust me, you don't want to be subjugated by my hair. It's very temperamental.
hello I have a problem I need to buy a small roll of Galvanized roof flashing 17/1000s of an inch for a project but I do not know what size this is can you please help ?
Sheet metal thickness is expressed as gauge so if you search for "Sheet metal gauge" you can probably find a chart listing their thickness in thousandths. I don't know off the top of my head, sorry.
Took a electromecanic course when i was young, one of the teacher talked in thousandths of a inch all the time..Just now i finally learn what it meant..Guess i wasent really paying much attention!
G'day day Stuart greetings from Tasmania Australia 🇦🇺 I am a very interested in lathe and milling work, I have been watching you for a little while now and I've learnt some very helpful ideas one was using the DRO on a mill. I must admit that I find the DRO a bit daunting and I still haven't quite got it I'm 65 yo and am finding it slow going. I really like the way you teach and a bit of humour goes a long way, anyway I have subscribed and got onto your Patreon site I feel it's only fair to give some back to you. Take care regards John
Hi John. Thank you very much for your support. I'm planning on making some DRO videos soon. Are there any questions you need answered or just some general tricks?
@@StuartdeHaro G'day Stuart I'm interested in how you use them from a complete novice , simply explained. The other thing I've signed in to Patreon could you let me know if it has gone through successfully thanks John
@@johnkinnane547 Yes it did. Thank you very much. I'll whip up a nice DRO video showing some of the features that are common to most. What kind of DRO do you have?
Stuart, Great demonstration. I have a question that I think would be a good beginner video. Whilst reading through a bunch of Workshop Practice Series books, you see terms like, free sliding fit, shake free fit, press fit, firm sliding fit. I know this would translate into the difference between the diameter of the part being inserted into the bore of another part. But what are those differences supposed to be for each type of fit. Also, if 3/8 = 0.375 of an inch, at what level of precision should this measurement be. For example, One print has the fractional measurement 3/8 and another print has 0.375. Thanks for your consideration. Laus Deo, Joe
Hi there. All of those fits change depending on the size of the mating parts. There's quite a lot written about fits in Machinery's Handbook. As far as the level of precision, most prints will give a range of tolerances based on how the dimension is written, so if it gave it as 3/8", you might have a +/-1/64" tolerance, whereas writing it in decimal form might make it +/-.002".
+|- .005 inch is pretty common tolerance in machining.Get down to +/- .0001 to .0005, fly cutting or milking won’t do it due to warping and flatness issues. Need to grind it.
at 1:42 1/64 expressed in terms of thousandths of an inch would be 16/1000 (rounding might not be helpful in the real world though) ...saying 1/64 = 0.015625 is 15,625/1,000,000 confused me because it's not expressed in thousands but millionths. However, the demonstration using the 1/4" dowel, (= 0.250") drives home the answer to the question first posed, 'what's a thousandths of an inch (0.001")?' .... it sounds like a small amount but it can make a very big difference as you see it falling right out of the 0.0251 opening. Thanks.
Rounding is practical in most cases. We're not going to be making something to .015625" so .016 or .0156 is fine. That said, if you divide 1 by 64 you get .015625. Thanks for watching!
I have grown up learning math all in USA and can never understand these inch fractions units and i have finished high school, college, snd graduate school. Metric just makes sense. Maybe because I studied sciences and they all use metric.
What if you get a measurement of .0044, would you say it as forty four ten thousands?, But saying 44 ten thousands would throw people off by writing it down as .4400
Why is .250 read as 250 thou (adding a zero so it is not read as 25 hundredths) but we don't add a zero on .375 to change from 375 thou to 375 ten thousandths?
Because our unit measurement is .001" or one thousandth and there are 250 of them in .250", hence 250 thousandths. Really it comes down to being fluent in the lingo. If you go into a machine shop and say 25 hundredths instead of 250 thousandths, there might be confusion and they will DEFINITELY talk about you later when they're on break and probably will for years to come. "Hey, remember that guy that wanted something made in hundredths of an inch..." You'd be a legend, like a machine shop yeti. Everyone knows the story but only a couple of people have actually seen it.
I think the reason for using a base unit of one thou is because a standard imperial micrometer's smallest division is 1 thou. It is a shame that there is no generally accepted name for the metric mic's equivalent, "huns" doesn't quite have the same ring. I once thought the name DaMu, Da a ten quantifyer and Mu for micron. DaMu could also be damn you, especially when you miss your mark by one..
I think where I really get tripped up, the first place to the left of decimal is expressed as 5 (5.) this is expressed as 5 one thou if it’s right of the decimal (.500) BUT when it is 3 places right of the decimal, then it is “five “ again...thousands of course. Does anyone see that confusion. I’m not arguing it, it just is taking some time for it to come natural for me.
Stuart de Haro oh man, this is getting crazy. For sure 5.0 is Five. What I'm saying is first spot left of decimal is spoken five.....blank, first spot right of decimal is 5....hundred thousandths but we know is it's actually the tenths place. I totally get all this, I'm not that confused as to not understand that 5.0 is five WHOLE units. It's just wacky that the tenths & hundredths are now SPOKEN differently simply to use THOUSANDTHS as a go to term. I seriously wished I never asked this "simple" question. Ugh...
@@nancymarrone6703 I'm a little late here but maybe this will help in the future. Figure out the smallest fraction your ruler does...usually 1/16 or 1/32. The multiply that value you were looking times the number of increments. So if you have a ruler that does 1/16. Then .88 times 16 is approx. 14. So it's 14/16 or 7/8 if you reduce it further.
It depends on what you're making. If you're talking about a clearance hole or something with a loose tolerance then rounding is totally fine. For tight tolerances I read everything out to four decimal places.
@vandehaze...you're way off on me. I own tons of tools and literally 2% are standard (imperial) i am ALL metric. Learning machining is kind of forcing me to deal with imperial. Can i get metric micrometers? Sure. Will i be about the only one using them? Almost. Will that will increase the difficulty in learning machining one thousand (thousandths??) Times harder? You betcha!
Nope, still not even close. 1/128 is roughly .008" (eight thousandths of an inch). If you had that much clearance between a shaft and a bore, the shaft would be rattling around in the hole quite loosely.
I won't argue with you there. As far as conversion between units it is so much easier knowing that everything is based on 10's instead of having to remember that a foot is 12 inches and there are 3 feet in a yard, 6 feet in a fathom, 5280 feet in a mile, and 3 miles in a league (BTW, that would make "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" a space story since the Earth is only 8,000 miles in diameter, meaning that the Nautilus is another 52,000 miles out in space). That said, accurate work can obviously be done in either system, it's just that the imperial system is originally based on anatomical features that craftsmen could have used out in the field. An inch is roughly the length of the first joint of your thumb, a foot is roughly the length of, you guessed it, your foot. Beyond that, the imperial system is based on cutting things in half rather than in tenths. We cut an inch in half, then cut that in half to get quarters, then again and again for 8ths, 16ths, 32nds, 64ths, etc. I think that is a universally relatable thing. No matter where you live, everyone likes cutting stuff in half. Thanks for watching!
Hi there Stuart, I think you misunderstood the book 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, it did not mean Depth, it meant the distance they travelled under the sea, I like your videos keep it up many thanks
That makes a lot more sense. Still, the idea of fighting a giant space squid somewhere between the Earth and the moon should be explored by Hollywood. Cheers!
Glad to see there’s still people out there that can take a joke. Thanks for the videos, I used it to show my 13 yr old son what I do for a living. Keep up the good work.
So researching it I found, machinists like to break an inch into 1000 parts. Half of and in would be .500, a quarter would be .250, an eighth would be .125 etc...It still seems that the .001 vs .100 would have to be and exception to that preferred method? They can't both be one one thousandth, it has to be said one tenth so the term "thousandth" could be used when you are dealing with a straight "tenth"??
There was no need for your research buddy. You already found the answer with this video. You say they divide in 1000 parts hence thousandth. It's funny to me you imperialist use fractions from metric system.
Van de Haze stop being a condescending prick and mind your business if your goal is to belittle rather than help. Others learns and interpret things differently...
I'm sure someone out there has had to do it and there's probably some really big measuring tools specifically for it. It's a tall order though. The longer your piece is, the more likely you are going to have issues because of error stacking, heat transfer, etc. For instance, let's say you have a 24 foot long pair of vernier calipers. The machine that engraved or etched those graduations would have to run on some kind of rail and be driven by a screw or possibly a cog belt in the case of a laser engraver. Let's say that it's a screw and it is super accurate with a max deviation on the pitch of .0001" per foot. Well, after 10 feet your .001" tolerance will have been reached and at 22 feet the graduations on the tool you are relying on for your measurement are off by .0022. Alternatively, let's say you have a micrometer that would do it. It only has a 1" range, so your error stacking is negligible, but the heat from your hand on the frame expands it a little where you are holding it, which changes it a lot at the far end, more than enough to screw up your tolerance. At that scale, it would probably be measured with a laser.
As per ANSI standard, English units do not have a leading 0 but metric units do. '.250' inches is correct annotation. This is important because ANSI allows you to make assumptions when something is not specifically called out. When you see '.25' on a drawing you can make the assumption that it is .25 inches. Alternatively when you see 0.25 you can assume 0.25 mm unless otherwise specified.
Wouldn't it be 25" for inches rather than 25'? It may just be typo or something or I may just misunderstand considering my initial search was how to read a caliper with a dial on it. I carve wood so I rarely deal with anything smaller than 1/8 inch. Lol.
An easier way to convert fractions to decimals and see what the next fraction would be is divide 1 by the denominator. 1 divided by 8 or 16 or 32 (common fraction sizes of drill bits) and that will give you the "unit" size in decimals. You can multiply that by however many 16ths or 32nds you want to know.
1.000 = one inch .100 one hundred thousandth .010 ten thousandth .001 one thousandth .0001 one tenth (one ten thousandth ) .00001 millionths 1.2505 one inch two fifty and five tenths
I'm no mathematician but this all looks correct except the "millionths " line. That looks like 1, one hundred thousandths... right? This would be 1 millionths... .000001 correct, or am I embarrassing myself? lol!
Thank you Stuart, but still lost. Adding the 0 after .25, the zero has no value, why add it to the number. I'm know this is very once to you, but to me, if I had $25 and you have me a zero...I wouldn't have $250 all of a sudden. I understand "our unit of measure is .001, but if I have you .375 would you say that 375 thousandth of add a zero and say it 375 ten thousandth? I really want to understand the logic behind this, not arguing...you got my thumbs up a subscribed!
It's really just because machinists talk in thousandths. It's simpler to refer to everything in terms of one unit, so .500" is still referred to as 500 thousandths because there are 500 of the .001" units. A mathematician might drop the zeroes and call it 5 tenths, but you can see where that would cause confusion in a field where 5 tenths means .0005". Likewise, in your example of.3750, a machinist would just call it 375 thousandths and 0 tenths rather than 3750 ten thousandths of an inch because that's just how we roll.
Didn't help at all for my question. Why is it called thousands if an inch, when its only ten'ths of an inch? For example if you stacked 40,000 feeler gauges that were 40 thou thick, what would that stack measure? 4'? 40'? Sure wouldn't be 1"
It's called thousandths of an inch because an inch cut into one thousand pieces is .001". That's your unit measurement. Your 40 thou feeler gage is .040" thick, 40 of those .001" slices, hence 40 thousandths. If you stacked 40,000 of those together (40,000 x .040) you'd get 1,600" or 133' 4".
Hmm, 0.001 = 0.0254? That's clearly wrong. This is why you must reference the measurement system. 1 thou = 0.254 mm. It's particularly important if exporting, selling abroad or working with other countries. Planes have almost crashed because one team was working in lbs of fuel and the other in kilograms but neither referenced the measurement units. It seems pedantic - until it all goes horribly wrong. You do not reference each individual measurement on the drawing, you do reference the system being used across the whole drawing in the same way as you would the projection being used. BobUK.
Wow you Americans must be insanely smart, since you don't see the need to simplify your measurements, and think it is easy to measure things like (1/4)"+(2/1000)" rather than 6.35mm+0.05mm. I'm lazy - I will stay metric!
I've said it before and I'll say it again. Accurate work can be done in any system of measurement. 1/4", 6mm, 62.5 hairs, it really doesn't matter. It's a target dimension either way. Regarding the relative intelligence of Americans, you will find very intelligent people in any society. Typically though, no matter where you are, you don't have to look very hard at all to find the rude, stupid, and highly opinionated ones.
Make the same with jumps over metric units of even 1 thousands of a centimeter, i will not even mention a milimeter. And then talk about precission. Imperial units should not exist.
