Method · Research protocol
How the record is kept
This page exists so you can check us, and so that the three-hundredth record is researched to the same standard as the first. If the method is not written down, the conclusions are not worth much.
1 · Source discovery
A figure is found before it is trusted. Discovery may begin anywhere — a retailer listing, a trade forum, a competitor's comparison table. Discovery never establishes a fact. It only tells us a claim exists and where to look for its origin.
2 · Four axes, recorded separately
Conflating these is the mistake that lets a marketing page stand in for an engineering document, and the opposite mistake that treats a maker's own statement as unreliable. It is neither: a manufacturer page is primary evidence of what the manufacturer says, and it is not independent validation.
| Type | What it is |
|---|---|
| manufacturer | Published by the maker about its own product. |
| engineering report | A structural or electrical calculation report. |
| certification | An evaluation report or approval issued by a certifying body. |
| government | A public authority — building department, county, agency. |
| standards body | A codes or standards organisation. |
| retailer | A seller that did not make the product. |
| independent publication | A publication with no commercial interest in the product. |
| competitor | A maker describing a rival's product. |
| trade | Working professionals in the field, including moderated trade forums. |
| Authority | Meaning |
|---|---|
| primary | The originating document for the claim it makes. |
| secondary | A reputable party reporting on someone else's document or product. |
| tertiary | A downstream repetition with no independent verification. |
| Strength | Meaning |
|---|---|
| high | Appropriate technical documentation for this kind of claim. |
| medium | An official statement from a party with direct knowledge, not independently validated. |
| low | Reported without access to the underlying documentation. |
| unverified | Encountered but not sufficiently supported. Not used as a value. |
3 · Claim confidence
Each individual figure carries its own confidence, independent of who published it.
| State | What it means |
|---|---|
| Verified | Supported by appropriate primary technical documentation for this kind of claim. |
| Manufacturer-stated | An official claim by the maker about its own product. Not independently validated. |
| Secondary | Supported by a reputable independent source rather than the originating document. |
| Unverified | Encountered but not sufficiently supported. Recorded, not treated as a value. |
4 · Critical claims
These subjects are held to a higher standard because getting them wrong has consequences beyond a bad purchase: certification, code, electrical, fire, permit, snow psf, structural, wind mph.
For a critical claim, a normal marketing page is never sufficient on its own. The record must state what independent engineering validation was located — including when the answer is none. A critical claim that cannot answer that question does not ship; the build fails.
5 · Manufacturer claims
Recorded as manufacturer-stated. Primary evidence of the maker's own position, used as the value, and never described as verified until a technical document is read.
6 · Competitor claims
A maker describing a rival's product is evidence that the claim was made. It is not evidence that the claim is true. Such a figure is recorded, attributed, and never used as a value. Where a product's entire record rests on competitor claims, the record says so and carries no numbers.
7 · Ranges
A range is preserved as a range. It is never averaged into a single figure, and never reported at its upper end. In scoring, a range whose upper value clears a requirement and whose lower value does not earns half the weight, with the reason shown.
8 · Missing data
Unknown is recorded as unknown. It is never estimated, never inferred from a sibling model, and never scored as a pass. A criterion with no recorded value earns zero and is reported as a gap.
9 · Price
Prices are a dated series from the first observation. We do not backfill, because a price we did not observe is not a price we can attest to. Each entry carries its basis — installed, factory direct, retail — because those are not comparable numbers.
10 · Certification
A certification claim is recorded as claimed until a document number is obtained and checked. For each we record what the document establishes, separately from what a jurisdiction may require, because a report is evidence a reviewer may accept and is never itself a permit.
11 · Retrieval and change
Every source carries the document date and the date we retrieved it. Specifications change; a record that has not been re-checked shows its last verified date, and an old date is information rather than an embarrassment.
12 · Open questions
Every record lists what we still do not know about it. That list is the work queue. When an item is closed the record's confidence rises, and the change is dated.
What this site will not do
- Give engineering or electrical advice. A description of what a code section says is not an instruction for your property.
- Call a product safe. Ratings are inputs to a decision made by people with stamps and liability insurance.
- Sell anything, or take money from anyone who does. See disclosure.
Corrections
If something here is wrong we want to know, and the correction is published on the page it affects with the date it was made. A document will change a record; an objection on its own will not. Send documents to record@shadeandsteam.com.