How We Organize Material Names
When you look up a Material in DCRG, Ratings are provided from chemical resistance tables containing that name, as well as for synonyms of that material. There are, however, different names for the same Material, synonyms (example: Buna-N, Nitrile, and NBR identify the same Material). Chemical resistance tables have a very limited number of materials represented, from one to thirty-some at most. Including synonyms allows you to access more Ratings.
Unlike Chemicals, most Materials are not a unique composition lending itself to a common database, like the Chemical Abstract Service Registry Numbers. There is no standard database for Material Names. Synonyms of Materials can come in many forms:
- Alternate names, like Buna-N and Nitrile
- Standard abbreviations, like LDPE for low-density polyethylene
- Tradenames, like Teflon, which has many different formulations
- There are nationally and internationally recognized abbreviations for plastics and elastomers.
- Misspellings: like Ehtylene Propylene or Polysterene
Unlike single chemical substances, most materials are not single substances, but a combinations of precursors. The product and processing to create the final product can and does affect the chemical resistance. The chemical resistance of these materials may be similar, but will differ depending on the different processing used to create the material. For this reason, Ratings in DCRG <USE THE LANGUAGE FROM THE WARNING – Right now when building table, our disclaimer is not shown. This is different from the Warning combining conditions>.
We define a synonym conservatively. For every Material name in a chemical resistance tables in our data, we have found clear references that identify common usage of the two terms defined as synonyms. For most tables there is a legend which indicates synonyms for the Material Name used in the table. When there is any doubt, such as for most tradenames, we do not assign that tradename any synonym.
Occasionally more than one Material name is in a header. Those can be
synonyms, such as Butyl IIR, for which Butyl and IIR refer to the same Material
mixed Materials, like PFA, FEP, PTFE – which are assumed individual Materials and not a mixture
Other ways to define synonyms:
- When the name is an obvious arrangement of another name. Examples: 316 Stainless; Floroelastomer, BunaN)
- When there is an obvious matching that is not ambiguous, possibly referring to two or more Materials. Examples: Polypropolyne; Floroelastomer.
This allow DCRG to find more Ratings for your required Chemical/Material combination, without you needing to know there are synonyms for the Chemical Name with which you identify the substance of interest. With this, however, we must stress that <INCLUDE LANGUAGE FROM THE WARNING.>