The importance of product binders

HeatingHelp

The importance of product binders

The importance of product binders

Read the full story here

Unhippy

You hit the nail on this Dan.....times are changing....just not always for the better.

Little side note.....alot of places are changing or have already changed to "online only" catalogues......which works fine until you end up working somewhere with no or crap cell signal and an internet speed that makes a snail look pretty nippy....like... oh maybe anywhere rural?

DanHolohan

I miss the chat that happened with the face-to-face briefings. We lost a lot when that went away.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

Steve Minnich

I agree Dan. I like to physically turn the pages when I read and, maybe unfortunately, most of what I read is technical literature. It's really hard to get your hands on product binders but I usually just bug the crap out of them until they finally relent and give me one, just to shut me up I'm sure.

furnacefigher15

As a guy in the field, its hard to find space for all the binders. The internet, and mobile devices are a great way to limit how much space I need.
The problem with alot of the online stuff is that it has all the current stuff, but is often limited on the older stuff that I run into all the time, which is why I still keep the books, just not on the truck anymore.

MarkS

Back in the day, the reference manual binders for an industrial control system could easily fill two shelves. After using them for a while, you could walk up to that shelf, pull off the binder you needed, and almost intuitively open it to within a few pages of the information you were looking for. There's a sense of location that's missing with online documentation. That's what I miss most.

Charlie from wmass

I still thumb through my walworth catalog from 1919.

Craig Maurer

As a former Rep, I used to stop to see Wholesalers and Contractors and Engineers that I hadn't seen in a while if for no other reason than to update their catalog. It was a great way to get in the door and the spontaneous connections led to a lot of business. As a current Wholesaler, I still have the time to see a conscientious Rep who wants to keep my library current.

DanHolohan

You are a wise man, Craig.

vvzz

Websites really lack in ability to look for info sequentially. There's also too much information.

On a related note on paper free society. In my field(software engineering) we often make a deliberate choice to use paper index cards and whiteboards to manage product progress. Even though there are software tools available for that. It's ironic, but for a lot of stuff paper can't be beat.

ChrisJ

I prefer all of my stuff in PDF format honestly.

I know exactly where it is and it never gets old or dusty. It does the same exact job and I can thumb through the pages by clicking my mouse.

It also takes up zero physical room.

SWEI

PDFs get a lot more useful once you ditch the Adobe bloatware that 95% of people use to read them.

I really miss my Mac. The OS X Preview app is orders of magnitude better than Acrobat, and does a fair bit of authoring to boot. There's another Mac app called Skim that a lot of researchers use.

On Windows, I like the Sumatra PDF reader. Low footprint, fast, and easy.

Though I still like having the older paper catalogs on the shelf...

Robert O'Brien

Still hanging on to them, and this is just a fraction!

ChrisJ

Robert O'Brien said:

Still hanging on to them, and this is just a fraction!

True,
But with all due respect, weren't you also around when they parted the sea?



I'm sure I'll pay for that one...........several times.

ChrisJ

SWEI said:

PDFs get a lot more useful once you ditch the Adobe bloatware that 95% of people use to read them.

I really miss my Mac. The OS X Preview app is orders of magnitude better than Acrobat, and does a fair bit of authoring to boot. There's another Mac app called Skim that a lot of researchers use.

On Windows, I like the Sumatra PDF reader. Low footprint, fast, and easy.

Though I still like having the older paper catalogs on the shelf...

I've never liked Mac OSX, always been a PC guy my self but I agree with not using Acrobat.

I forget what I'm running on my machines but it's a third party app.

hvacfreak2

Paper reference gives you a chance to see things that you might not be thinking about or even know exist. Electronics and piping products , maybe a small ball check valve or a DIN mounted switch to make a project more streamlined that you see while looking for your specific product. But on the other hand you can't beat a smartphone when you are staring at a 6 ft controls cabinet on a roof top unit wondering which contactor is C5A.

Aaron_in_Maine

I like to sit and look through literature every now and then. But getting rid of the milk crate in the truck and having the manuals on my iPad is cool too.

Steve Minnich

As they started to become more and more scarce, I started making my own.

nicholas bonham-carter

That is real dedication on your part!--NBC

JUGHNE

Just so my wife doesn't see your picture.....too damn neat and organized!

So whoever dies with the most binders on the shelf wins!!

Steve Minnich

It's a sickness.

I've got a lot more but those are the ones I put together.

JUGHNE

I think I have all of mine in one room, I can usually find what I am looking for....no one else could. My wife considers me a hoarder.

One of the most helpful books was the Fundamentals of Pneumatic Controls by Robertshaw dated from 1976. This was very useful before the internet was available. Had one system to take care of and would have been really lost without it.

About 20+ years ago a heating/HVAC salesman advised me to keep all my old catalogs from HW, WR etc because the old stuff info would not be available on line and eventually even the new info would not be in print. He is still at his desk at 80+ years.