| Short ton | |
|---|---|
.jpg) TheWire Bridge inNew Portland, Maine, United States, with a 3-ton gross weight limit. The short ton is primarily used in the US. | |
| General information | |
| Unit system | United States customary units |
| Unit of | Mass |
| In base units | 2,000 lb |
| Conversions | |
| 1 short tonin ... | ... is equal to ... |
| SI base units | 907.18 kg |
| Metric tons | 0.90718 t |
| Long tons | 0.893 long tons |
Theshort ton (abbreviation:tn[1] orst[2]), also known as theUS ton,[3] is a measurementunit equal to 2,000 pounds (907.18 kg). It is commonly used in theUnited States, where it is known simply as aton;[1] however, the term is ambiguous, the single word "ton" being variously used for short,long, andmetric tons.
The various tons are defined as units of mass.[4] They are sometimes used as units ofweight, theforce exerted by a mass at standard gravity (e.g., short ton-force). One short ton exerts a weight at onestandard gravity of 2,000pound-force (lbf).
In theUnited States, a short ton is usually known simply as a "ton",[1] without distinguishing it from thetonne (1,000 kilograms or 2,204.62 pounds), known there as the "metric ton", or thelong ton also known as the "imperial ton" (2,240 pounds or 1,016.05 kilograms). There are, however, some U.S. applications where unspecifiedtons normally mean long tons (for example, naval ships)[5] or metric tons (world grain production figures).[citation needed]
Both the long and short ton are defined as 20hundredweights, but a hundredweight is 100 pounds (45.36 kg) in theUS system (short or net hundredweight) and 112 pounds (50.80 kg) in theimperial system (long or gross hundredweight).[1]
Ashort ton–force is 2,000pounds-force (8,896.44 N).
20 hundredweights = 1 ton