Oil Pressure Gauge.

[Southern Star]

Just a very quick query, the oil pressure gauge on my boat is marked in kPa (kilopascals). The massive majority of oil pressure gauges (on cars) I've ever seen are calibrated in pounds per square inch, is it common practice for boats to use kPa as the measurement and if so, why?

[bizzard]

1 Kilopascal is 0.145037738 psi. But interestingly, for a Kilo you can get an awful lot of Pascals jelly babies.

[Flyboy]

Common in Europe. 100 kilopascals = 1 Bar = 14.7 psi. You could easily put some marks on it at appropriate psi positions.

[RLWP]

No, you just happen to have a kPa gauge

 

Richard

[steamraiser2]

Amazing how many people get confused by metricalationalbuggeralsational meazurments! Tiz pounds! simples!

[5thHorseman]

I once spoke to a Kiwi who berated Brits for "old fashioned" use of miles on our roads saying we should catch up with the real world and use kilometres.

He also complained that using miles made it appear to take so much longer to get from place to place

[Galeomma]

I'm used to Bar, I don't mind PSI but I bloody hate Pascals. One ship I was on was in MPa, did my head in, that one.

[Tony Brooks]

Pascals just has to be a unit defined by scientists rather than engineers. It is far too small for most real life applications. A bit like measuring things in hundreds of mm.

[Scholar Gypsy]

Pascals just has to be a unit defined by scientists rather than engineers. It is far too small for most real life applications. A bit like measuring things in hundreds of mm.

 

Indeed so - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal_(unit) it is a Newton per sq m.

 

The hectopascal (100 Pa) is now used in altimeters.

 

The Gigapascal is used eg in Young's modulus, a measure of stiffness eg diamond is 1200 GPa (or 1.2 Tera Pascals). A nice list of things not to get confused about here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young%27s_modulus

[RLWP]

You don't get much more engineering than Young's modulus

 

Richard

[jake_crew]

I once spoke to a Kiwi who berated Brits for "old fashioned" use of miles on our roads saying we should catch up with the real world and use kilometres.

He also complained that using miles made it appear to take so much longer to get from place to place

I believe in NZ long journeys are calibrated by how much time it will take, rather than the distance.

Edited April 13, 2015 by jake_crew

[5thHorseman]

I believe in NZ long journeys are calibrated by how much time it will take, rather than the distance.

But it takes longer if you measure it in miles

[Chalky]

Pascals just has to be a unit defined by scientists rather than engineers. It is far too small for most real life applications. A bit like measuring things in hundreds of mm.

 

It's used a lot in industry but as KPa - kilo pascals.

 

If the gauge is a standard round can gauge you could get a properly calibrated psi gauge off something like an MGB, MG Midget etc. Look on ebay.

[Tacet]

A gauge measuring Pascals is better 'cos it is regardless of gravitational pull whereas psi will be effected by altitude.

[MtB]

I have a digital manometer offering gas pressure measurement in Pascals.

 

A propane regulator delivers gas at 37 milliBar, which is 3,700 Pascals. Or 0.37 kPa. Neither value is quite as natural to visualise or work with as Bar or milliBar. I know what 1 bar of water pressure feels like to hold back in a pipe with my thumb, for example.

 

Similarly air vent areas are now supposed to be measured in square millimetres. Results in huge values hard to visualise. An air vent of 20 square inches is easy to visualise, but not one of 12,903.2 square millimetres.

 

MtB

[mark99]

1 fruit pastals = 0.00145037738 psig and a sore tongue.