The Other Testers
You know what you need to add to your standard testing repertoire?
On a recent Monday morning, inside an unremarkable, low-slung building in Yonkers, N.Y., blue-coated technicians conducted lab work. Among their calibrated tools: Cheez Whiz, pig’s blood and Maine coon cat hair.
They’re testers for Consumers Union, the nonprofit publisher of Consumer Reports magazine and website whose ratings drive spending decisions on some 3,000 product models annually, from vacuums and lawn mowers to strollers, shower heads and smoothies.
That’s some boundary analysis I wish I could try.
In the lab, technicians are always developing ways to accelerate the wear and tear products normally experience over the course of years. Treadmills, for instance, get pounded repeatedly with a spinning metal drum imbedded with rubber green balls that mimic running feet. (The device’s nickname: Johnnie Walker.) Stainless-steel grills are stationed in a conditioning chamber and pelted with a salty spray to test for rust potential. Sometimes the goal is to mimic extreme scenarios, like an accident, in which bicycle helmets get strapped on a metal head form and dropped from various heights onto sharp and rounded objects.
I try to apply that same sort of creativity when I face an application.
Meanwhile, do you suppose mechanical engineers around the world post comments on the Consumer Reports Web site about how no one would do that? Probably not, because unlike software “engineers,” mechanical engineers have a sense of shame.
