Every carton sealing tape ships with a technical data sheet, and every TDS looks reassuringly precise: peel adhesion 83 oz/in, shear 48 hours, tensile 124 lbs/in (JLT-602). The problem is that these numbers are only comparable when you know what each test actually measures — and many field failures trace back to specifying the wrong property, not a defective product. What a TDS is — an...