High School Math: Conversions, Practical Examples and Applications
Setting ourselves up... inspired and ready!
Conversions have been around for ages, and now more than ever with this wide world web revolution. If you travel to Argentina for instance, you get faced with the metric system right away. You start seeing on the road signs like 'Speed limit= 85km/hr" If you rented a car at the airport, you are now like, "on your own."
If you go to Frankfurt Germany, you get faced again with the metric system wherever you go. You were in a bubble where all you needed to know was miles/hour, Fahrenheit degrees, furlongs and inches. I don't even mention the language because that would be another story.
The Metric System
In 1799, Napoleon introduced the metre, originally based on the metre des archives and the kilogramme des archives. Condorcet and revolutionary team, defined the decimal multiples in order to keep coherence. The U.S. is the only industrialized country that hasn't adopted the system completely. "Tradition and the very example of Benjamin Franklin, made us think about it too long."
CGS, ISO, DIN, ASA, ASTM and so many more; those were the haunting scientific initials in college, and boy they gave us a headache. "Conversion? Who cares about them?" Listen kid, I'm just writing this article in order to open a door, away from your texting and that catchy guitar from "Tin lizzy." Here you have it!
Texting
If you are listening to tin lizzy's, "Boys are back in town," and texting at the same time, you noticed that your adrenaline caught up with your own freaking mood.You dig it?
If You text 60 words per minute
then in 4:47 minutes you have texted 60(4:47)= 268.2 words. Oh boy!! You should sign for HP right now!
Conversions intrinsically imply "conversion factors"
If you want to convert inches to centimeters, you need a conversion factor:
INCHES(CF) = Centimeters
Either you go to a conversion table, or you go back in time and ask Thomas Jefferson, who wanted and proposed a transition toward an international standard. But Congress, yeah there we go again, they just looked the other way and never approved it.
Inches(2.54) = Centimeters
What did we do?
We added a congruent factor. It might look a little harder when you start recognizing your teacher's method:
INCH(2.54cmts/INCH) = MEASUREMENT in Centimeters
At first is easy, but later on you will see why we start from scratch and take our time ourselves. Besides the longer you read, the longer AdSense recognize our "labor of love." Can you imagine a future writer taking his time with folks like you? Not even George Lucas or Steven Spielberg came this close! Back off, Ben Affleck and Matt Damon!
Traveling
By listening to "Last train to London" from ELO. We find ourselves driving from Buenos Aires north to Santa Fe Capital, 440 kilometers from the capital. What ###!
Now you come to us.
Lord, convert Kilometers to miles please!
Just start by finding the conversion factor
1 mile = 1.609 Kmts
440 kmts[1mile/1.609 kmts]= 400(1/1.609)= 273.46 miles
NOW YOU HAVE TO REALIZE THAT CONVERSIONS KEEP A CONGRUENT PATTERN OF ELIMINATION:
1= km/km= 1km/1000mt (anything multiplied by number one gives you the same number)
Still Driving through Cordova, heading to Santa Fe, Argentina
The signs are weird looking: "Do not drive and drink," and Speed Limit, "100km/hour." The world is in front of us. What in this awesome world are we doing in Argentina? A long story my friend!
100km/hr ........ How many miles per hour for U.S. standards?
100km[1mile/1.609klmt]= 62.15 miles
We just add the hours back, so the speed limit is set to 62.15 miles/hr
Yikes! and double Yikes!! with a tango Argentino! Those "Gauchos" love their foreign friends. Read my lips pal!
Lord, my Teacher makes it so hard..!
The trick of the matter is just add conversion factors as multipliers. All is practice in life, and like we said before, math is like learning another language. You don't just read a story for your literature course; you have a new world of symbols to deal with. Here are more examples: I use my favorite song from all time, "everybody wants to rule the world!"
Kilometers/liter to Miles per Gallon -- Multiple Conversions
According to Mercedes Benz, a 2012 E350 Sedan model can give you 12.3 kilometers/liter, but we want to know what's the equivalent in U..S standards:
Obviously, conversion to Gallons/mile involves two parts:
Liters>>> gallons and.
Kilometers>>> miles
We know, or should know that,
1 mile = 1.609 kilometers
1 U.S. gallon = 3.7853 liters
12.3 Klmts/ltr = 12.3 (1mile/1.609)(3.7853/gal)
12.3 Klmts/ltr = 12.3(3.7853)/(1.609) miles/gallon = 46.56/1.609 = 28.93 miles/gallon
The answer is: 28.93 miles per gallon in U.S. performance standards. Not too bad for a $40,000 Mercedes-Benz!
Lastly, a little of Physics
All because of Newton and that darn apple...
The acceleration due to gravity near the earth surface is 9.81 m/s2
Convert this gravitational unit in ft/s2
Our strategy would be to go from meters to centimeters and then catch up with feet (ft)
m>>>cm>>ft
Our "structure of conversion" will look like this template:
We know by checking some basic conversion tables that:
1ft = 30.48 cm
and 1m = 100 cm
Replacing the values in the template shown, we can obtain the final conversion in ft/s2:
9.81m/s2 = 9.81m/s2 (100cm/1m)(1ft/30.48cm)
=9.81(100)/30.48 (ft/s2 )
= 981/30.48 = 32.185 ft/s2
So the acceleration of gravity in ft/s2 is: 32.185 ft/s2
Dude! She blinded him with science!!
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