Question 1

What can I use Kernspoke to identify?

Accepted Answer

Lookup accepts a manufacturer and part number. It is designed to help you inspect a published industrial part record, its evidence trail, and any documented relationships before you specify, compare, or investigate a substitution.

Question 2

What do the different lookup results mean?

Accepted Answer

A lookup can be exact, an alias, ambiguous, no-match, or insufficient-evidence. Those states describe what the reviewed record can establish about the submitted manufacturer and part number; they are not a promise that a near-looking reference is the same part.

Question 3

What if a reference is obsolete or malformed?

Accepted Answer

An obsolete or malformed reference may return no-match or insufficient-evidence rather than a guessed identity. Check the manufacturer and part number as printed, review any returned suggestions or alias state, and send the source or correction details to support when the reference needs investigation.

Question 4

What evidence does a result show, and how should I read confidence?

Accepted Answer

Source trails identify the publisher, document title, URL, retrieval date, and locator. Confidence describes how strongly the reviewed evidence supports the result. If a source set does not document a field, Kernspoke keeps it explicitly unknown rather than filling the gap with an assumption.

Question 5

Does a documented cross-reference mean I can use the alternative?

Accepted Answer

No. A documented cross-reference or complementary relationship is evidence of that documented relationship only. It is not a drop-in-replacement claim, an engineering approval, or a guarantee of interchangeability or compatibility in every application. Confirm electrical, mechanical, and application requirements before substitution.

Question 6

How do I report a correction or ask about a record?

Accepted Answer

Use the Contact page for source corrections, record questions, and commercial enquiries. Include the manufacturer, part number, source URL or document locator, and the field, claim, or relationship that needs checking so the record can be assessed against its evidence.

Question 7

What is included in the Free offer?

Accepted Answer

Free is $0 and includes 5 interactive lookups per UTC month. The core lookup shows evidence, possible alternatives, compatibility limits, and a verifiable buying path when the reviewed source record provides one. Verified public result pages are quota-free.

Question 8

What is included in Independent?

Accepted Answer

Independent is US$39.50/month with 25 interactive lookups per UTC month. It keeps the complete core lookup value for individual engineers, independent suppliers, and smaller distributors, but does not include private projects, exports, API access, bulk CSV/BOM lookup, or shared workspaces.

Question 9

What is included in Professional?

Accepted Answer

Professional is US$79/month with 100 interactive lookups per UTC month. It adds private research projects, multi-line comparisons, evidence provenance, reports and printable views, CSV export, API access, bulk CSV/BOM lookup, and shared workspaces with team membership.