gradazione superiore a 35° centesimali

English translation: alcohol content of more than 35% vol.

GLOSSARY ENTRY (DERIVED FROM QUESTION BELOW)
Italian term or phrase: gradazione superiore a 35° centesimali
English translation:alcohol content of more than 35% vol.
Entered by: Ivana UK

17:06 Sep 10, 2009
Italian to English translations [PRO]
Wine / Oenology / Viticulture
Italian term or phrase: gradazione superiore a 35° centesimali
Obviously doesn't relate to wine but this was the closed field I could find!

Appears in the exclusions list of an insurance policy.

Bevande costituite da soluzioni idroalcoliche di gradazione superiore a 35° centesimali, comprese le distillerie.

What's the best way to deal with this? Not sure if a literal translation would work here ..
Ivana UK
United Kingdom
Local time: 12:49
alcohol content of more than 35% vol.
Explanation:
Oliver is on the right lines.

Alcohol content by volume and centesimal alcohol measured on the Gay-Lussac scale are the same thing. Since alcohol by volume (ABV) is the EU-wide standard, I would suggest using the "% vol." notation.

"Proof" has more than one meaning. In the US, it is double the percentage alcohol content by volume (80° proof US = 40% vol.) whereas in the United Kingdom, proof was determined by actually "proving" the spirit. This involved wetting a small pile of gunpowder, applying a lighted match and seeing what happened. If the gunpowder ignited, the spirit was "over proof". In practical terms, "100° proof spirit" (ie, just strong enough to ignite) contained about 57% alcohol by volume.

HTH

Giles
Selected response from:

Giles Watson
Italy
Local time: 13:49
Grading comment
Thank you Giles (and Oliver too)!
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer



Summary of answers provided
4 +1alcohol content of more than 35% vol.
Giles Watson
3alcoholic content in excess of 35°
Oliver Lawrence
Summary of reference entries provided
It seems this has been asked before
cilantro

  

Answers


16 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5
alcoholic content in excess of 35°


Explanation:
gradazione=gradazione alcolica in this case='alcoholic content' from Zanichelli tech dictionary.
From Wikipedia: "Britain, which used to use the Sikes scale to display proof, now uses the European scale set down by the International Organization of Legal Metrology (IOLM). This scale, for all intents and purposes the same as the Gay-Lussac scale previously used by much of mainland Europe, was adopted by all the countries in the European Community in 1980. Using the IOLM scale or the Gay-Lussac scale is essentially the same as measuring alcohol by volume except that the figures are expressed in degrees, not percentages". So maybe '35 degrees' or '35 percent' are interchangeable in this context.

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Note added at 56 mins (2009-09-10 18:02:59 GMT)
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Proof is certainly not the same as ABV (according to Wikipedia proof=ABV*2); probably safest to go with %, then, it certainly seems consistent (35% is about right for a spirit, isn't it).

Oliver Lawrence
Italy
Local time: 13:49
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in category: 23
Notes to answerer
Asker: Thanks Oliver, that's exactly what I was wondering - if I could say 'with alcohol content of more than 35%' (but % would be ABV and I wasn't sure if that was the same). Probably best sticking to degrees, but is that used nowadays in the UK?

Asker: Looks like they're not interchangeable after all (degrees have to be divided by 1.75 to obtain the ABV - according to the link to the glossary entry provided by cilantro)

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2 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +1
alcohol content of more than 35% vol.


Explanation:
Oliver is on the right lines.

Alcohol content by volume and centesimal alcohol measured on the Gay-Lussac scale are the same thing. Since alcohol by volume (ABV) is the EU-wide standard, I would suggest using the "% vol." notation.

"Proof" has more than one meaning. In the US, it is double the percentage alcohol content by volume (80° proof US = 40% vol.) whereas in the United Kingdom, proof was determined by actually "proving" the spirit. This involved wetting a small pile of gunpowder, applying a lighted match and seeing what happened. If the gunpowder ignited, the spirit was "over proof". In practical terms, "100° proof spirit" (ie, just strong enough to ignite) contained about 57% alcohol by volume.

HTH

Giles


    Reference: http://apella.ac-limoges.fr/musee-gay-lussac/Experiences/Are...
Giles Watson
Italy
Local time: 13:49
Specializes in field
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in category: 293
Grading comment
Thank you Giles (and Oliver too)!

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Rossella Mainardis
2 hrs
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Reference comments


19 mins
Reference: It seems this has been asked before

Reference information:
http://www.proz.com/kudoz/italian_to_english/food_dairy/1333...

cilantro
Israel
Works in field
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish, Native in ItalianItalian
Note to reference poster
Asker: thanks - I didn't see this when I checked the glossary - accroding to a comment on this link, to obtain the ABV %, the degrees should be divided by 1.75, so looks like ABV and degrees cannot be interchanged after all (which answers my question)!

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