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Education News
Clay | Glaze
| Firing | Toxicity
| Materials | Books
| People | Events
| Glossary
It would be unthinkable for the representative of a country to speak of his homeland in a simplistic or stereotypical way. Your product data sheets are may be do doing exactly that.
It presents materials with a few lonely numbers and almost no comments or description. Isn’t that a bit like having an ambassador who can only answer questions about his country that have a numerical answer? Materials have mineral, chemical, and physical presences that combine in complex ways to impact all aspects of their use.
Every time I read a simplistic data sheet I throw my hands up in the air and say “What the hell is this stuff anyway?” Data sheets are just not answering my questions.
Materials change so if the data sheet doesn’t change isn’t that a bit like an ambassador that never goes back to his home country to learn about new developments? Material properties trend and vary and customer information needs vary, data sheets that never change point suggest the company is making little effort to capture this information.
The monospaced typewriter went out in the late 70's.
With the advent of the Internet, companies have an opportunity to provide better information then they have been. However, are they taking advantage of this opportunity? To some extent. My observation is that web data sheets are still their same old tired self! So far companies are tending to think in terms of the old media. A web data sheet has the potential of doing much more than just informing.
One of the biggest frustrations ceramic technicians face is getting to know the properties of all of the raw materials available. The 'low profile' of some manufacturers and the lack of product information that we can 'sink our teeth into' is a frustration. Data sheets usually provide lots of numbers but often there is a lack of 'down to earth' information about what the material really is, what it is good for, how it is mined and manufactured, and what makes it better than competitive products. There is always the feeling that 'out there' somewhere is a more suitable material. Particular brands are often used for reasons completely unrelated to physical, mineralogical, or chemical properties (i.e. tradition, prices, availability, lack of information or knowledge on others).
As a user of materials I want to know more. I want pictures, descriptions, honesty; I want to know the trade-offs. I want to know about the companies and the people. I want to know more than just the analysis of the frits I use and the oxide system for each stain. In the past it has not been easy to give me that information. However, almost all ceramic technicians will be on the Internet soon. Supply companies now have a 'soap box' they can use to inform me. I'm listening.
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