Standards, measurement and gauging

There shall be but one measure throughout the land. This famous excerpt from the Magna Carta expresses clearly the role of government in the regulation of fair trade. Central to this task was 

Standards are necessary in industry in order to ensure uniformity and to establish minimum requirements of quality and accuracy. The adoption of standards eliminates the national waste of time and material involved in the production of an unnecessary variety of patterns and sizes of articles for one and the same purpose. Standards are desirable not only in the manufacture of articles but also for the instruments used to ensure the accuracy of these articles. 

The word standard can refer to a physical standard such as length or to a standard specification such as the paper standard. 

The National Measurement Office (NMO) is responsible for all aspects of the National Measuring System (NMS). In the UK all our measurement issues are looked after by the NMS, which is the nation s infrastructure of measurement laboratories delivering world-class 

The National Physical Laboratory (NPL) is the UK s National Measurement Institute which sits at the heart of the NMS. For more than a century NPL has developed and maintained the UK s primary measurement standards. These standards underpin an infrastructure of traceability throughout the UK and the world which ensures accuracy and consistency in measurement. The national primary standards, which constitute the basis of measurement in the UK, are maintained in strict accordance with internationally agreed recommendations. They are based on the International System of Units (SI). 

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New chapters have heen added to cover Standards, measurement and gauging as well as Moving loads and Drawing specifications and data. 

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