Why is a "perfect score" 180 points?

Under KCBS rules, a table of six judges is given a tray of entries to judge, and each of the six judges awards each meat entry a separate score (from 1 to 9) in three areas:  appearance, tenderness and taste.

The KCBS computer program calculates the total score for each entry by the six judges, discards the lowest score, and totals the other five scores, which is the team's score for that entry. If a judge scores an entry with the highest score (9) in all three areas, the total score is not 27 points (which would be 9 points per area times 3 areas).  Instead, the highest score for an entry by a single judge is 36 points because the scores are weighted differently for each judging category. Thus, if the five highest scores are each 36 points, then the entry receives a "Perfect 180" -- since 5 times 36 equals 180.

The historical reason that the highest score by a single judge 36 points is that, until a few years ago, the taste score was doubled and added to the appearance and tenderness scores.  This is called a "weighted score" system.  Thus, if a judge scored 9's in appearance, taste and tenderness, then the total score was 36.

A few years ago, KCBS decided to change the weighted score system.  Instead of making the taste score worth twice as much as both appearance and tenderness, the new system weighs the tenderness twice as much as appearance, and it weighs taste twice as much as tenderness.  In other words, if appearance is worth 1, then tenderness is worth 2, and taste is worth 4:  four times as much as appearance.  However, KCBS wanted to keep 180 points as a perfect score and thus to keep 36 points as the highest possible total score by a single judge, and KCBS decided to continue the basic system that each judge awards a score of from 1 to 9 in the three areas of appearance, taste and tenderness. To reach this intended result, KCBS changed the weighting formula. 

As described in the KCBS Rules, the new system weighs the appearance score times 0.5714, tenderness times 1.1428, and taste times 2.2858.

What is a "Perfect 180"?

"A Perfect 180" score results when all six judges at a table give a contest entry three 9s.  If one judge at a table gave a contest item a 9, 9, 8 and all the other judges gave the entry three 9s, the entry would be scored 180 points, but it would not be a "Perfect 180" as one judge scored that entry lower than three 9s.  That judge's results would be thrown out as KCBS rules in scoring do not count the lowest scoring judge in an contest item.