What do you use for perimeter units?


Joe_Carrick
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This question is for Metric users. 

Generally for Imperial users we would use the ft-in notation such as 22'-7".

 

When noting the perimeter (size) of a room what units of measurement do you use (m, cm or mm)?

If you use m how many decimal places?

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I live now in US, but when I did my engineering drafting in college to denote 12'-0" x 11'- 0" area in the metric system 

"3,60 x 3,30". No need to indicate "m". Archaic dm never used, cm - very rarely used (commonly by individuals but not in a engineering and architecture papers).

 

For parts measurements look like:  48mm x 26mm and not (4,8cm x 2,6cm).

 

Room sizes 10,3 m2  almost never two digits (this could depend on country ). As you know from my previous post chief architect can not do m2,  and

at least my school professors would never accept m2 or sq m. My guess not chief target market.

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BrownTiger,

 

Chief can do superscript.  You just have to do it in a Custom Macro - or use Chief's Special Character Macro. 

 

Basically, no one has answered my question so far. 

Assume a room 3050 mm x 4006 mm.  The Perimeter would be 14112 mm.

Would you note that as:

  14112 mm

  1411,2 cm

  1411 cm

  14,112 m

  14,11 m

  14,1 m

  14 m

 

I'm guessing that it would be the 14,112 m but that's just my guess.

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You would use the meter unit for most of architectural design except when detailing objects like furniture.

For example a room dim. can be 9,60m x 10,75m (two digits after comma). Objects using pre-dimentioned materials, ie plywood or lumber, would be dimentioned in mm. (600mm instead of 0,60m)

The dm or cm are not used.

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BrownTiger,

 

Chief can do superscript.  You just have to do it in a Custom Macro - or use Chief's Special Character Macro. 

 

Basically, no one has answered my question so far. 

Assume a room 3050 mm x 4006 mm.  The Perimeter would be 14112 mm.

Would you note that as:

  14112 mm

  1411,2 cm

  1411 cm

  14,112 m

  14,11 m

  14,1 m

  14 m

 

I'm guessing that it would be the 14,112 m but that's just my guess.

 

That's right I forgot, chief does have 2 super.

 

Perimeter is "14,11 m"  two digits after decimal point. Note the space.

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Conversely....

On any plan, If I see a number with 2 decimal places such as 7,14 I'll always take this to mean meters. Even if there is no "m" suffix.

If I see just a number with no decimal place, such as 378 I'll assume millimetres, since mm is the standard unit of measurement on a plan and meters with two decimal places the standard for site plans.

hurray metric system

:)

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Three decimal places seems to be the standard for metric surveys in my area and is the only way to differentiate from an imperial survey because the Unit Indicators do not seem to be used by professionals.

post-4797-0-68312300-1466198693_thumb.jpg

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It depends on the size of the number ie 988mm , 1805mm  2405mm or 2.405m , 20.225m.

We don't have a hard and fast rule but our 8m tape measures are generally marked in mm with bold increments every 100mm  so would have 900 -  3000  -  100 bold text,

however sometimes the 3000 can be 3.

I generally use mm up to about 8m to 10m

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Thanks Francois,

  m with 2 decimal places and naturally the decimal indicator is a comma.

 

Joe,

 

Not in Oz.

We would never use a comma as a separator. 

We could have 1, 2, or 3 decimal places, depending on the accuracy needed.

And we would usually drop any zero's from the end.

 

So 14.112m would usually do it, but quite often the m would be left off because it is obvious that we are indicating meters.

 

And same as Graeme in the post above.

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Glenn,

 

So in OZ you use a period just like we would in the USA.  In addition, you use up to 3 decimal places and drop trailing zeros - and for anything less than 10000 mm you display it as mm instead of m.

 

This sounds like it could get confusing, particularly if you drop the m and/or mm.

 

I'm working on a macro for my June 2016 subscribers (perimeter of any polyline based object) and it sounds like I'll need to provide a special version for OZ vs any other country.  What about NZ?  Do they use the same format as OZ?

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Joe, FWIW, the architect on Bonaire (used to be Netherlands Antilles, now part of the Netherlands) that I sometimes provide rendering services to dimensions everything in mm with no separators and no units indicator (mm is assumed). Don't know if this is standard practice for all architects on Bonaire but it appears to be acceptable for the local plan permit office.

 

ie

1                  

10                 

100               

1000

10000

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Glenn,

This sounds like it could get confusing, particularly if you drop the m and/or mm.

... not really since decimals are never used for mm. So if there is a decimal, whether or not a point or a comma it always means meters.

Also even if your measurement has no fractional portion you always include the decimal/comma and 0 to make sure everyone knows your talking meters. Ex 37,00 or 37.00 because if you just write 37 everyone will interpret this as millimeters.

Millimeters are never fractional.

(like who cares about half a mm?)

There's never any confusion.

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I agree Michaelgia. Any residential plan I have done has always had dimensions in mm without using the mm after number. Only area of rooms done in square metres to 2 decimal places with decimal not comma. We were taught never to use both for dimensions only one or the other, mm or m...with mm being the preferred or standard. 

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OK, so the rule is:

 

Show it in mm (preferred)

 10550

-or-

Show it in m (only for values above 10000)

 10,55 or 10.55

 

and if the number is 10000

then for m it would be

  10, or 10.

 

IOW when shown in meters show the separator but drop trailing zeros.

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10000 in meters would be 10 000,00 or

I assume in AUS it would be 10,000.00

Either way if it's meters always show the decimal and two or three places after decimal.

No decimal means millimeters always

so 10000 in millimeters is 10 000

Or 10,000

Basically once the decimal makes an appearance then this signifies meters.

Europe usually uses a space for thousands separator.

Comma in Britain and Australia (I think) I'm Canadian

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