"I need eight hours of sleep every night."
Translation:Jag behöver åtta timmars sömn varje natt.
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'timmars' - I haven't seen that before. How do you know when to use 'timmars' instead of 'timmar' for hours?
It's timmar with a genitive/possessive -s at the end. It's the same construction as in English:
- I'll see you in three weeks' time.
- The train should get here in one hour's time.
Swedish seems to use this construction for other things as well. See the sju sorters kakor - seven types of cookies.
It is perfectly natural in UK English to say he got eight hours' sleep, or it is in three weeks' time. I think it is not just a Swedish construction.
Still, we've never seen this construction before and I don't think it has been explained.
of course this example is ambiguous at best because in english we also make plurals by sticking an s on the end. It does not really make sense to speak of the hours owning the sleep or the weeks owning the time. The real question is whether in swedish it is a possessive form or a plural.
Surely it must be a possessive as the plural would only be timmar, without the s. Swedish doesn't tend to form plurals by adding -s.