25 Year Track Record

What does it mean when a manufacturer say's  "We have a 25 Year Track Record" unless they can provide accurate records of all projects over the 25 years, then the statement is meaningless.

Most will have no idea or have accurate records of projects they have sold onto, simply because they sell vis distributors and they are so often reluctant to divulge their client list.

They might refer you to their agrement certificate and thats a start, but they will only have selected projects collected for the purpose.

Ask manufacturers for failed projects and you will get a stone wall, yet its what we need to know. I recently gave my professorial presentation to my University, and it, I stated that its not unreasonable to ask these questions, I wanted it to be presented via an electronic search, I add their products to my drawing and the CAD package or perhaps a specialist service, that searches online for information good and bad.

There is the obvious litigate routes we can check, the Technology and construction Law courts are the obvious start. blogs, open notes, manufacturers literature, online applications to both planning and building regulations will offer another excellent project list. The Government has some excellent sites, trade records, weather stats from the met office, some even have API's or application program interfaces ready and waiting to allow you to do this.

Would I subscribe to a specialist service that would not only, search for my specific requirements, but perhaps research manufacturers from say the RIBA product selector, visit sites and ask questions, independently, take photos, make notes, its an interesting question, and one that might bring a little attention form lawyers.

But back to the main question, of can we search now for data, this all part of what I have named  Data Convergence Specialist, the Technologists role in applying search parameters to algorithms that will look at all these open source data sources and start to give us answers to questions we should be asking.

Data is becoming so important to us yet we get bogged down in the tech site of BIM, and its application. BIM is important, but some of use should be looking a little further into the future, and laying down a few ideas and research notes on how BIM might evolve.