Well, not sure if this post will make any sense, but here
are some of my thoughts after reading some of the previous discussions.
I’ve been designing a couple things myself (a saddle
pad and a shell for Impression Pad testing) and have been trying to figure out
the best ways to test because I am the type that would not sell anything I didn’t
use and believe in, nor would I make any claims that I wasn’t 100%
confident in. So I have had to make
some decisions on when to use real world testing and when to use “lab”
testing.I could be 100% confident
in my lab testing, but that doesn’t mean it always applies to the real
world.
I do believe a testing range should go to extremes –
but it shouldn’t be the entire test.I was trying to make sure that the shell that I have designed for the
Impression Pad wouldn’t reduce the heat transfer from the horse to the
dough, or if it did sufficiently, that I would be able to tell people to ride
for a bit longer.
I started my test in the house with a heating pad – on
high.As I waited for the temp to
stabilize, it got awfully high – over 130 degrees and still climbing.I decided that any data collected in
that range was meaningless. Who
cares how fast a material allows heat transfer in a range that will never occur
in the real world?I don’t
need to know how the shell would work in situations that would kill the horse.
So I do think lab testing is valuable because it can give
very good information based upon single variables in a controlled situation. But it is important that the scale be realistic.And it still does become important to
collect the real world data.The Supracor (as has been described) would give completely
different results static in a lab than it would with the constant motion of a
horse allowing air to flow. It
could be that there are similar results for Equipedic
and other pads. Lab results can’t
invalidate real world results all by itself.It just has to be understood why there
is a difference.
I haven’t read all the pages of the Equipedic site, but in looking at the heat comparison page
I come up with the following questions:
1.I am assuming
that the heat source is applied to one side of the pad and the temp is measured
on the other side? So if less heat
comes through one pad, doesn’t that mean that more heat is being held at
the source?I could be completely
wrong on my assumption of the method of testing, but it wasn’t explained
on the page.
2.I suspect
that any pad with a highly compressible foam will
change its properties due to compression.So I think the lab testing with a 20 pound weight is even more
meaningless than the temp of 110 degrees.
Just my initial thoughts – because I am trying to
figure out appropriate testing myself!
