A recent article in The Washington Post about house remodeling noted the large amount of waste that results.
I remember a few months ago an article on this list noted that when construction is metricated there is very little waste. Could someone point me to it? I'd like to educate The Post a bit. Thanks Carleton -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Pat Naughtin Sent: Monday, April 10, 2006 22:23 To: U.S. Metric Association Subject: [USMA:36536] Re: Contractors resisting metrication (was April 1) On 11/04/06 9:31 AM, "Pierre Abbat" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Monday 10 April 2006 14:04, Martin Vlietstra wrote: >> A four by two become 100 by 50 - at any rate it did in the UK. > > The actual size is pretty close to 40 by 90. It's 100 by 50 before it's > milled. > > phma Dear Pierre, Martin and All, The construction industry in Australia used the opportunity of metrication to re-engineer almost all housing dimensions including the materials that were used and their descriptions. For timber, this meant that the quality (such as number and placement of knots) was monitored much more closely and the compressive strength, for example, was much more predictable. As part of this process timber sizes were specified to the nearest millimetre and professionals have learned that this is fairly reliable. Some amateurs are still talking '2 by 4' or '4 by 2' for things that now measure almost exactly 90 mm by 40 mm. One of the things that I admired in this process was the re-engineering of houses so that wall studs were no longer placed at 18 inch (457 mm) centres but at 600 mm centres so that the standard sheeting materials of 1200 mm by 2400 mm could be fitted more easily with major reductions in waste both in materials and in time taken to measure, cut, and fix them. Cheers, Pat Naughtin PO Box 305 Belmont 3216 Geelong, Australia 61 3 5241 2008 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.metricationmatters.com This email and its attachments are for the sole use of the addressee and may contain information that is confidential and/or legally privileged. This email and its attachments are subject to copyright and should not be partly or wholly reproduced without the consent of the copyright owner. Any unauthorised use of disclosure of this email or its attachments is prohibited. If you receive this email in error, please immediately delete it from your system and notify the sender by return email.
