• 420sixtynine [any,comrade/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    you probably won’t have anything marked for 48ths or whatever arbitrary fraction

    except the fractions aren't just random, that's the nice thing about it being divisible by 12, almost all of the time you do have those markers, so yes, you do have 48ths

    • Segorinder [any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      In this example we're talking about inches and an inch is not any more divisible by 12 than a centimeter. Generally you're not going to see 48 divisions crammed into an inch on a ruler. You can have a set of specialty yardsticks with divisions set up for dividing by 3, 5, 7 etc. but you could do that with a meter the same way.

      • 420sixtynine [any,comrade/them]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago

        Except I have several tape measures with 64ths, they aren't exactly uncommon and you can do 48ths with 64ths

        • Segorinder [any]
          ·
          edit-2
          3 years ago

          The argument was that imperial was better because you could do an exact division and get 6 and 25/48".
          25 48ths is 33.333 repeating 64ths. You still have to eyeball a third of a division, the same way you would have had to eyeball half a millimeter.