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Well, as I was taking a shower, getting ready for bed, the signifcance of the .636 average value of a half cycle of a sine wave emerged from the depths. A DC meter reads AVERAGE values. A ripple on a DC voltage does not affect the meter reading because the average of a full sinewave is zero. To measure AC voltages, the ordinary multimeter places a diode or rectifier in series with one lead. The meter will now read the average of the wave form it sees but it doesn't see the full sine wave. Since it sees only the positive half cycles, it registers not .636 of the peak voltage but only half of that or .318. Of course the scale is calibrated to read RMS as that is what is important in power equations and consumption. The diode/rectifier has a voltage drop across it and this drop is not linear across the range so the AC scales on most multimeters are not as linear as the DC scales. I think this classifies as TMI - or maybe WTMI - Way Too Much Information. It's a completey different ball game, though, for peak reading meters.
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