Imperious imperial

Why is it that shotgun loads are measured in grammes, but rifle powder loads and bullet weights are given in grains?

Mike says: Until the 1980s, shot loads were given in ounces and the standard clay shooting load was 1⅛oz. Then, within the sport there was some thought that the clay load should be reduced to 1oz, and to promote the idea Sporting Gun and Eley organised a series of 1oz shoots with Eley 1oz cartridges at grounds throughout the country. They were very popular.

However, it was only a matter of time for the dreaded metrication curse to catch up with shotgun shooting, and grammes were the penalty we paid for being part of the international scene.

On the other hand, most

(but certainly not all) rifle ammunition used in the UK was and still is developed in the USA, and Americans – God bless ’em – stick mainly to the Imperial system of weights and measures. Calibres are given in decimal fractions of an inch, and the dear old grain (which is one seven-thousandths of a pound) still persists.

And if anybody reading the above gets the idea that I am biased in favour of the Imperial system, they are perfectly correct!