PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Everybody knows a two-by-four isn't two inches by four inches.

In fact, federal-government standards define a two-by-four as measuring 1.5 inches by 3.5 inches.

But that hasn't stopped Mikhail Abramov, of Illinois, from filing what he hopes will certified as a class-action lawsuit against Home Deport for selling undersized lumber.

His suit is similar to one filed by Michael Fuchs and Vladislav Krasilnikov, also of Illinois, against a regional store chain called Menards.

The three men suing for undersized lumber claims are all represented by the same lawyer Yevgeniy Y. "Eugene" Turin, of McGuire Law, Chicago.

Abramov's suit, filed in federal court in Illinois in April, says that he went to a Home Depot in Palatine, Illinois, in December to buy a four-by-four for a "small home improvement project." When he got home, the suit says, he found out that the wood was only 3.5 inches by 3.5 inches.

The suit says that Abramov was deceived by Home Depot and would have paid less had he known he was getting less lumber.

It says that Home Depot sells "lumber products that were falsely advertised and labeled as having product dimensions that were not the actual dimensions of the products sold" and that "unbeknownst to consumers, the product dimensions advertised by [the store] are not the actual dimensions of the products being advertised."

"In fact," the suit says, Home Depot's "dimensional lumber products all have materially smaller dimensions than those represented in its advertisements and product labeling."

The National Institure for Standards and Technology, the federal-government agency that governs how things are measured, says on its website, "The term 'two by four' is considered a 'nominal size,' used to describe approximate rather than actual dimension. Nominal sizes were originally derived from dimensions of rough lumber before being surfaced (made smooth, even, and uniform in size and shape) at the mill."

Both cases are pending as the judge handles pretrial issues.