> Foot Pounds or ft-lbs is the correct unit.

Or lb-ft or pound foots :-)
(ie as it's a multiplicative product the order is commutative)(ie 
order ain't important), even though it's invariably expressed as 
ft-pounds.

[[[Probably really foot-pound  with no "s" but if Olin doesn't mention 
it, which he well may, then I won't either]]].[[ie units are properly 
singular BUT vulgarly often plurali[s|z]ed.

Interestingly, while we are trying to be oh so correct, the common 
equivalently used metric units are incorrect :-).
ie kg.m is NOT a proper unit set for torque. One should use N.m, as 
torque is the product of force x distance, and kg is a measure of 
mass. The two are, as you all know perfectly well, linked by a 
constant of proportionality g which conveniently happens to be close 
enough to 10 in the mksa system as to be able to be taken as being 10 
and thereby inviting a whole world of order of magnitude errors.

The imperial system is saved from such 'error' only by the fact that 
the imperial (fps system) mass unit is too sluggish for common use as 
g in fpsa units has a value of about 32, and they have made up an 
artificial mass unit named the pound mass (lbm) which is a gravityith 
(1/g) of the actual unit of mass, the slug. As 1 lbm 'weighs' 1lbf in 
a 1g gravity field everyone is uproariously happy and blissfully 
unaware. Were it not for this ingenious feat (not to be confused with 
acoustically eponymous 0.30480000000r meter unit) then the Brits may 
well be torquing about foot-slugs and thereby annoying the unit 
police. (Or slug/foot, as per this instance, and annoying them even 
more).

It's interesting (depending on who you are and how your brain works) 
to ponder what would have been the fate of some common measures if the 
Brits had not so brilliantly invented the lbm. (Note that nobody has 
ever invented the N_m (Newton_mass)(not to be confuse, though it 
certainly would be,  with the N.m) and nobody ever seems to 
(correctly) ask for goods by weight in Newtons. But, I digress (still 
more). Lacking the lbm we have to deal in slugs and parts thereof. The 
ounce (Oz) = 1/16 of the lbf (and therefore having a mass of ~= 1/32 x 
1/16 slug) would be about 1/512 slug or about 2 millislug (ms). As s 
is already taken as a unit of time they'd have to find some other 
convenient letter. [[It must have one but people seem to be mealy 
mouthed about what it is]]. An 8 ounce glass of anything would then be 
about 15.6 millislugs - say 16 to allow for foam (should the 
'anything' have foam). Asking for 16 millislugs of anything is liable 
to lead to some strange responses.

Rather gratifyingly, Gargoyle has 5 hits for millislugs.





        Russell



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