"David Billington" wrote in message
...
... I can remember talking to an old gent at a lumber yard on Long
Island, NY, and he said he could remember the days when a 2x 4 was a 2x4
and he was referring to planed and prepared, then they started to shrink
to what we have today. He reckoned it was a ploy to get a few more pieces
out of a log and make a bit more money. Do they really need to take a 1/4"
off each side to clean up rough sawn to a 2x4 planed and prepared.

I'm an old enough gent to remember my father buying full dimension 2x4s to
remodel my grandfather's ~1890 house. When he needed modern (1950s)
dimensions the yard hand would run it through a planer on the end of the
sales counter. IIRC the accepted spec was 1-5/8" x 3-5/8".

I fell, saw, dry and plane my own oak lumber. With the warping and cupping
1-1/2 green barely cleans up to 1-1/8". I had hoped for 5/4". They are 10"
wide which is more susceptible to cupping than a 2x4, but for construction
all widths need to have the same thickness.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumber
See, we really are Metric, they just haven't informed the carpenters yet.
19mm = 0.748".

jsw