OK all,
You know they are different, but do you know why?
No, neither did I, but I just found out and thought I would share it with you.
Before the American revolution when British colonies used weights and
measures supposedly equivalent to those used in England.
The system of standard weights and measures wasn't well established in
Britian and many standard copies taken to America differed from place to
place.
Thus the U.S. bushel and gallon, and their subdivisions, often differed from
the corresponding British units, causing many arguments between traders.
So the colonies adopted the British Wine gallon of 231 cubic inches - but
England was then using not only the wine gallon, but also the ale gallon of
282 cubic inches.
In 1824 Parliament established the British Imperial gallon as 277.42 cubic
inches (the volume occupied by 10 lb of distilled water at room temperature).
Thus the American gallon, which remained at 231 cubic inches is about 17 per
cent smaller.
To confuse things even further, the American fluid ounce is slightly larger
than the British because the U.S. pint, (one-eight of a U.S. gallon) is
divided into 16 fluid ounces.
In Britain the pint, though larger, is equivalent to 20 fluid ounces.
(information courtesey of the daily mail, August 23 2001)
Curious huh?
Leon
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