Specifications, Standards, and Test Methods

American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM)
ASTM offers its index to specifications and test methods online at its web site. This index is searchable by keyword and spec number, and gives a summary, index terms and order information for each document retrieved. Full-text is not available, but this is a quick method of searching the entire ASTM collection with little effort. It certainly substitutes for a lost printed index.

DOD Index of Specifications and Standards (DODISS)
This is the online version of the Department Of Defense's printed index. The DODISS index gives title, number, date and status reference for GSA and military government specs, standards, Commercial Item Descriptions, and Qualified Product Lists. For the private industry groups it covers, such as ANSI, ASTM, SAE, UL and many others, it gives title and spec number. This index is keyword searchable and is good as a starting point for determining the existence of and identifying numbers for specs.

Custom Standards Services, Inc. - Engineering Documents and Regulations
This company offers access to the catalogs of 75+ organizations and agencies which issue standards, specifications and test methods. Additionally, descriptive background information on some of the trade associations is given, but not direct links. The online catalogs contain document number, title, publication date, price and order information. The documents may be ordered from this site.

Construction Criteria Base
Construction Criteria Base is a CD-ROM product of the National Institute of Building Sciences. It is an impressive construction library of information contained on 7 disks, covering nearly everything the government has issued on the subject of construction, including regulations, handbooks, guidelines and specifications. The web site Index of Titles to all documents on the CD-ROM set may give the spec number and title needed to make a request for further information from the issuing organization.