DB to calculate ceramic glazes

[pichon]

I am pretty new to Access and I am not sure if what I want to do is possible.

What I have is a list of substances and their ingredients. Many substances contain differing amounts of the same ingredients.

I want to make ceramic glazes with many substances in them and know what the total is of each ingredient.

Example: My glaze has 2 substances in it. Substance A is made of 30% lead and 70% iron. Substance B is 20% titanium and 80% iron.

So I want to type in that my glaze needs substance A and substance B and have it tell me the total amounts of lead, titanium, and iron that will be in that glaze.



I would like to have all of my common substances in a table with their ingredients and quantities so that all I need to do is type the name of the substances into a list and have it call up the data for that substance and calculate the answers from which I can create a report.

I hope this makes sense.

Thanks.

[NTC]

yes it makes sense and can be done.

first you need a list table of those 'metals' ; iron, etc. 1 column table

then you need a Substance table; have an ID column that is autonumber & primary key, then Name (A, B, C,) column, Metal column, MetalAmount column

The Metal column make to be a LookUp field in its table property - and the wizard will help point you to your first table; doing this will avoid having to retype in the metal each time.

With this Substance table you will have for instance:
1 A Lead .3
2 A Iron .7
3 B Titanium .2
4 B Iron .8

With this set up - you'll be able to then sort, do sums, reports etc - grouping around the Substance or the Metal or whatever you need....

[pichon]

I pppreciate it NTC, I think I get it.

ManyThanks

[pichon]

I have a question about the substance table and what columns to create. The best way to describe it is to give you another example.

Example: Nepheline Syenite has these ingredients in these quantities;

potassium .220
sodium .713
calcium .056
magnesium .011
alumina 1.03
iron .002
silica 4.555

Nepheline Syenite has a total molecular weight of 450.5.

This substance will always have these properties. When I make a glaze which has Nepheline Syenite in it, I will need all of this info displayed as well as the ingredients in the other substances with their ingredients and quantities shown as well. I will also need the molecular weights listed for each substance.

How should I make this table so each substance will be associated with the appropriate quantity of all of the ingredients for that substance? Do I put a Metal A column and a Metal A Amount column, Metal B, Metal B Amount etc. for each substance?

[pichon]

Does anyone know?

Thanks.