Editorial Policy

Sourcing standards

Every numeric claim on this site traces to a named, linkable source. The order of preference is deliberate, because in this category the ranking of sources is not obvious.

1. The manufacturer’s install manual or FAQ. The best source available here, because a document that has to tell you how to fit something cannot avoid stating fasteners and spacing — exactly the context a marketing page omits.
2. The manufacturer’s product or spec page. Usable, and always labeled as theirs.
3. A retailer listing, only where the manufacturer publishes nothing. Weaker, always labeled as a retailer figure, and flagged where retailers disagree with each other — which happens, and is itself worth reporting.
4. Our own arithmetic, labeled as such, with the working shown so a reader can check it.

Community consensus — forum threads, subreddit opinion — may be cited as consensus and named as such. It is never presented as measurement.

What we will not publish

• Fabricated testing. We do not test products and will never write as though we had. No implied trials, no claim of having handled a product, no lab, no owned units.
• Invented specifications. No estimated gauges, no inferred capacities presented as published, no figures recalled from memory.
• Invented prices. Prices render only from a live, date-stamped feed. No feed means the page says “check price”.
• Invented ratings, reviews or testimonials. Steel Slat has no customer reviews and publishes none. We do not display star ratings of our own, and our structured data contains no Review or AggregateRating markup, because we have no first-party rating to put in it.
• Credentials we do not hold. No trade credential, no certification, no standing panel of advisers, no tenure claims.
• Links to affiliate programs we have not joined. Amazon is the only network wired into this site.
• Structured data that asserts what the page does not show. A price in schema that a reader cannot see on screen is spam.

Corrections

Specs change, manufacturers revise published ratings, and we make mistakes. When a figure here is wrong:

1. Tell us, ideally with a link to the manufacturer page.
2. We check the claim against the source document.
3. If it is wrong we correct the page and update its last-checked date. If the change is material to a ranking, we say what changed on the page itself rather than quietly editing it.
4. If we cannot verify either version, we say the figure is disputed and show both.

Report an error, or write to info@steelslat.com.

Review cadence

• Prices: daily, automatically, once the live feed is active.
• Roundups and comparisons: re-checked against current manufacturer specs at least every six months, and immediately if a product is discontinued or a rating is revised.
• Reference and capacity pages: at least every twelve months, and immediately if a manufacturer revises a published rating.
• Install guides: at least every twelve months, and immediately if a manufacturer changes its stated method.
• Trust pages: annually, and immediately on any change to how the site is funded.

The “last checked” date on a page updates only when the content actually changed. It is not a build timestamp, and it is not refreshed to make a page look fresh.

Independence

No manufacturer has any input into what appears here. Rankings are decided against the criteria on The Method before affiliate availability is considered, and several products we recommend cannot be bought through our links at all — see the disclosure page for the specific list.