Material Selector Manual

Advanced Search Help

MatWeb's Advanced Search combines all of the current search functionality into the single most powerful search MatWeb has to offer.

To perform a search using Advanced Search:

Find the type of searches you want to conduct (Text, Property or Material Category).
Select or input the initial set of criteria of the search into the drop down or text boxes.
Click on the "Add" button to add your criteria. Registered users may add up to 3 criteria. Premium users may add up to 10 criteria.
You should see your criteria appear in the "Selected Search Criteria" area, along with the count.
After you have added the criteria you want, click on the "Display Search Results" button to begin the search.

To edit criteria from a search:

Click on the paper and pencil icon next to the criterion you wish to edit. Material Category criterion types cannot be edited.

To delete criteria from a search:

Click on the trash can next to the criterion you wish to delete. Any criterion in the search can be deleted.

Ordering and paging search results:

The default order of search results is MatWeb's index numbering system, which is designed to keep similar materials together.
Premium users can sort the results set by property value (increasing or decreasing) or alphabetical by name (ascending or descending). The sort order can be changed by clicking the up/down arrows by the column heading on the search results.
To change the number of results per page, select the desired quantity under "Results" and then click the "Apply" button.

Adding materials to your compare folder:

What does the Min and Max value tell me?

The MatWeb database contains data between these ranges. Searching outside of these ranges generally will not produce any results.

What is a Property Group?

Some "properties" in the property tree are actually Property Groups. A Property Group allows a group of properties can be searched as if they were a single property. Property Groups are indicated in the Property tree by this icon :

What is an Optional Condition?

Some properties have conditional data associated with them in our database (where the property varies by temperature, pressure, load, etc). If conditional data exists, then you will see the option to select a condition, and you may search on the condition.

What is the "Normal Range" for a property condition?

Some property conditions have a "normal range" associated with them. For example, the "normal range" for temperature is room temperature or about 20 - 25°C. Non-conditional data is assumed to be "normal", so searching withing the "normal range" will return mixed conditional and non-conditional data. If you would like the search to return only conditional data, then make sure your search criteria is outside of the normal range.

What does the "Use Interpolation" check box do?

Conditional data is often incomplete, and may contain sparse data points spread out over a large range. In MatWeb, interpolation is a mathematical search technique that attempts to find materials *as if* condition data points were filled in between the known points. See this article for more detailed information.
Since interpolation is a type of estimate or "guess", if you find a material via interpolation, you should review the actual material data sheet to see if the results seem sensible.
Generally, interpolation techniques involve more processing, and therefor often taking longer than a normal search.
Generaly, selecting the interpolation checkbox is useful if you have a narrow range of conditions that you would like to find matches on. The wider your conditional search range, the less likely it is that interpolation will help you find additional materials.