UNITS AND DIMENSIONS

UNITS AND DIMENSIONS

Wall Street Journal, June 6, 2001
SEOUL, South Korea – A mix up in the cockpit over whether altitude guidance was
measured in feet or meters led to the crash of Korean Air Lines McDonnell Douglas
MD-11 freighter soon after takeoff in Shanghai in April 1999, investigators said.
The crash killed all three crew-members. Five people on the ground were killed and
40 more were injured when the plane went down in light rain onto a construction
site near Shanghai’s Hongqiao Airport.
According to a summary of the crash report released by South Korean authorities, a
Chinese air-traffic controller directed the pilots to an altitude of 1,500 meters (4,950
feet). The plane was climbing rapidly to the level when the co-pilot told the pilot he
thought the instructed height was 1,500 feet, equivalent to 455 meters. The
international aviation industry commonly measures altitude in feet, and the
confusion led the pilot to conclude the jet was almost 1,000 meters too high, so he
quickly moved the controls to lower the plane. As the plane descended, the pilot
realized the error but couldn’t correct the mistake in time.
South Korea’s Ministry of Construction and Transportation said Korean Air Lines
would lose the right to serve Seoul-Shanghai cargo route for at least two years
because of errors by the pilots. Korean Air Lines said it would appeal the decision….
 Units

UNITS, DIMENSIONS, AND VALUES

Dimensions How do they differ?
Values
Example:
Dimensions – are our basic concepts of • 110 mg of sodium
measurement such as length, time, • 24 hands high
mass, temperature, etc. • 0.5 seconds duration
• 5 gallon of gasoline
Units – are the means of expressing
the dimensions, such as feet or Value Unit Dimension
centimeters for length, and hours or
second for time. 110 mg mass
24 hand length
Value – is the numerical worth of the 0.5 seconds time
units and dimensions 5 gallon volume

Classification of Dimensions and its respective Units

• Fundamental (or basic) dimensions/units are those that can be measured independently
and are sufficient to describe essential physical quantities
• Derived dimensions/units are those that can be developed in terms of the fundamental
dimensions/units
 FUNDAMENTALS AND DERIVED DIMENSIONS
Density

Volumetric
Mass Flow
Flow

Volume Time Mass

Area Velocity

Length Acceleration Force

 Cardinal Rule in Problem Solving:

SYSTEM OF UNITS
Attach units to all numbers that are not fundamentally dimensionless
Practical Benefits:
• Diminished possibility of inadvertent inversion of any portion of the calculations
• Reduced intermediate calculations and time in problem solving
• A logical approach to the problem rather than remembering a formula and
plugging numbers to it
• Easy interpretation of the physical meaning of the numbers you use

Most engineering problems use one of three systems of units

• SI (Systeme Internationale, mks) is commonly used by scientists. It is in
everyday use in most of the world.
• cgs
• Engineering (American, English, fps) is the traditional system of the US and UK.
Although the UK changed official systems in the 1970s, the US has not.

Traditional unit systems were based on customary quantities

yard was distance from King's thumb to his nose
but today all systems use basic units defined in terms of measurable physical
constants.
1 meter is the distance equal to 1.65076373x106 wavelengths in vacuum of the radiation
corresponding to the transition between two levels of the krypton 86 atom
CONVERSION OF UNITS
What is a mole?
The amount of substance that contains as
many elementary entities as there are
atoms in 0.012 kg of carbon 12.

SI:

1 mole = 6.023 x 1023 molecules ( gram mole, mol)

AES:

1 mole = 6.023 x 1023 mole cules ( pound mole, lb

mol)
WHAT IS TEMPERATURE?

ATURE?
TEMPER
WHAT IS
An indication of the internal energy contained in a substance
Mono-Atomic Gases: Linearly proportional
Poly-Atomic Gases: translational, rotational and
vibrational kinetic energy.

Temp is a measure of but not directly proportional to internal

kinetic energy.
PRINCIPLE OF OPERATION
TEMPERATURE DEVICES

Expansion Thermometers
Liquid in glass
Bimetallic
Filled system/distant reading
Pyrometers
Thermocouple
Resistance
Radiation and optical pyrometers
 EXPANSION THERMOMETER
Liquid in Glass
Bimetallic
Filled System/Distant Reading
 EXPANSION THERMOMETER
Liquid in Glass
Bimetallic
Filled System/Distant Reading
PYROMETERS
Thermocouple
Resistance
Radiation and Optical
MEASUREMENT OF TEMPERATURE

Relative Scales
Fahrenheit (°F)
Celsius (°C)

Absolute Scales
Rankine (°R)
Kelvin (K)
 DEFINITION
Pressure is defined as the amount of force exerted on a unit
area of a substance:
force N
P  2  Pa
area m

Atmospheric
Air
 UNITS FOR PRESSURE
Definition or
Unit
Relationship
1 pascal (Pa) 1 N/m2
1 bar 1 x 105 Pa
1 atmosphere (atm) 101,325 Pa
1 torr 1 / 760 atm
760 mm Hg 1 atm
14.696 lbf/in2 (psi) 1 atm
 STATIC PRESSURE
Pressure at the bottom of the static column of
fluid:

F
P   gh  Po
A
where: P = pressure at the bottom of the column
of the fluid
F = force
A = area
ρ = density
g = acceleration of gravity
h = height of the fluid column
Po = pressure at the top of the column of
the fluid
Alternative form considering consistency of units:

F g
P   h  Po
A gc
PRESSURE RELATIONSHIPS

Gage pressure (PSIG)

Absolute pressure (PSIA)
Vacuum pressure (PSIV) or (in Hg)
Atmospheric pressure (14.7 psi)
OPERATION OF PRESSURE MEASURING DEVICES

Manometers
Bourdon tube
Bellows gage
OPERATION OF PRESSURE MEASURING DEVICES

Manometers
Bourdon tube
Bellows gage
PRESSURE RELATIONSHIPS

Absolute Pressure = Atmospheric Press. +

Gage Press.

Vacuum = Atmospheric Pressure - Absolute Pressure

 MEASUREMENT OF PRESSURE
Absolute pressure: -The pressure of a
fluid is expressed relative to that of
vacuum (P=0)

Gauge pressure -Pressure expressed as

the difference between the pressure of
the fluid and that of the surrounding
atmosphere.

Pabs  Patm  Pgauge

Manometers
 MEASUREMENT OF PRESSURE DIFFERENCE
Remember the formula for static pressure

P  gh  Po

Pa  P1  1d1 g

Pb  P2   2 d 2 g   f hg

P1  1d1 g  P2   2 d 2 g   f hg
Underlying principle
If fluid 1 and 2 are the same: ρ1= ρ2= ρ
Fluid pressure is the same at any two points
of the same height of a continuous fluid
P1  P2  (  f   )hg
Pa  Pb