Many companies are researching and purchasing industrial products online, but how often are products purchased that ultimately do not meet the expectations or requirements for a given application? Factory Direct Pipeline Products Inc. (http://www.fdpp.com) is the largest online wholesaler of industrial strainers and filtration equipment. They discovered early-on that although industrial pipeline products are common to virtually every manufacturing application, the thought process and methodology to select products often lacked consideration of critical design criteria such as straining ratio, screen velocity and clean pressure drop.

Traditionally a process engineer with an understanding of fluid mechanics would review a vendor’s pressure drop charts and formulas with the onus on them to select the right product. Industrial e-commerce is driven mostly by immediate need for a product and many of the people performing online research for these fluid handling products are not aware of critical aspects that need to be considered when sizing pipeline products such as simplex and duplex strainers. The lack of knowledgeable support during the selection process coupled with the fact that the formulas are often scattered throughout a website results in misapplied products. An example of this would be selecting a simplex strainer based upon the existing pipeline size and not the maximum flow rate it is expected to handle.

Factory Directs’ Customizable Datasheets provide the user with a way to review critical product characteristics and to compare them to other brands of industrial strainers. Ultimately this helps educate the user and enables them to make an informed decision about the value of a particular product. Another key aspect of customized datasheets is that it helps build confidence that the user is selecting the most appropriate product for their application. Whether customers know it or not, they begin to subconsciously commit themselves to the vendor that provides them with all the information that they require to make a purchasing decision. The concept of customizable datasheets will revolutionize how industrial products are marketed and sold online.