Fifty years of decimalisation

[Archie_tect]

1:48 and 1:96 drawings used to really annoy me, having to add lists of imperial dimensions soon persuaded you that metric wes better! 4'6"7/8ths, 7'10"5/6ths and the like... mind you £sd maths was just as annoying at school!

 

[lane]

I think we should go back.

As one of the more mature IT people, I could do with a couple of years consultancy at suitably exorbitant day-rate to help with the transition

As an accountant I am not so sure!

 

[MichaelW2]

Granted we've 10 fingers, but really !

I'm from Norfolk and I object to this comment.

 

[Drago]

I'm from Norfolk

Gimme six!

 

[Joey Shabadoo]

Watching YouTube videos of blacksmithing, it's really annoying that the majority are American and use old-timer measurements. I'm constantly having to ask Alexa "What's 3/16ths in mm?"

Worse, they measure nails in pennies!

 

[Profpointy]

Watching YouTube videos of blacksmithing, it's really annoying that the majority are American and use old-timer measurements. I'm constantly having to ask Alexa "What's 3/16ths in mm?"

Worse, they measure nails in pennies!

I gather they say "mil" to mean a thou' rather than a millimeter. What could possibly go wrong ?

 

[GetFatty]

Someone will be along shortly to “take back control” and rescind decimalisation

 

[Darius_Jedburgh]

I worked on the switch.
All banks closed for two days to prevent panic.
There was not much work to do on the day. Half crowns, sixpence and three pence pieces had been taken out of circulation.
The new 10p piece was the same size and weight as the old 2 shilling/Florin. Likewise with the 5p piece and the shilling. These were interchangeable but the old coins were gradually filtered out.
Bank staff had to turn up, but there was not a lot to do.
At the end of day one we went to the pub. At closing time we went to an all nighter at Wigan Casino for some Northern Soul. 3AM we were wandering round Manchester looking for an all night Chinese restaurant.
I have no idea how I got home, only that my mother woke me up at 7AM asleep on one of our fireside chairs.
Back to work with even less to do so we all went home after lunch.
Wednesday morning was an anti climax. The switch just happened and everybody took to it with no trouble.
Made all our internal calculations much easier.

 

[gom]

Cor blimey. Is there anyone on this forum who DOESN’T remember £sd ?

 

[Drago]

Someone will be along shortly to “take back control” and rescind decimalisation

And decimalisation will be all set to stay by a narrow margin, then Barack Obama will stick his nose in, get the waverer's backs up, and suddenly we'll be back to the Denari and Sesterces

Lets make currency great again!

 

[Darius_Jedburgh]

We've got three weeks to save the £.s.d.

 

[Darius_Jedburgh]

Cor blimey. Is there anyone on this forum who DOESN’T remember £sd ?

I've still got a full set of predecimalisation currency. As we had access to supplies of coin we investigated the possibility of producing presentation sets of old currency.
We could get bags of coin straight from the mint, we had a printer who could cut out cards to hold the coins, and we knew a plastic guy who could make wallets for us.
All legal and above board - we would buy the coins at face value from the bank.
We never took it on because it was soon obvious that most folk were more than happy to see the back of the stuff.
£.s.d. was not lamented at all.

But I kept one of our test samples, for old times sake.

 

[Smokin Joe]

Remember this?

Max Bygraves DECIMALISATION - YouTube

 

[Ming the Merciless]

I gather they say "mil" to mean a thou' rather than a millimeter. What could possibly go wrong ?

Mil for million

 

[snorri]

Remember this?

No!
I can remember where I was working on the run up to the changeover, and those around the meal table at the hotel I was staying in on Decimal day but have no recollection of that song.