Do you want to estimate the service lifetime of your product? Will it last 20, 50 or more than 100 years?
The estimation of service lifetime via high pressure autoclaves can give you answers.
The intended service life of plastic products is no longer 10 years, but often 30, 50 or even 100 years. A service life estimation is advisable to check whether the material quality is suitable for the application and to avoid expensive repair and maintenance costs. In the high-pressure autoclave test, samples in an aqueous medium are exposed to an increased temperature and an increased oxygen overpressure. After certain time intervals, samples are taken and subjected to index tests.
At the same time, the oxygen pressure and thus the oxygen consumption due to the oxidation of the sample is continuously recorded. This can give indications of the beginning of the aging process after the stabilizers have been used up. The greater availability of oxygen leads to accelerated thermo-oxidative ageing and acceptable test times of weeks to months before the failure criterion is reached. By means of 3D or Arrhenius evaluation of the failure times under different test conditions, an estimation of the service life under application conditions is obtained.
SKZ – Testing GmbH
Technologie-Zentrum
Friedrich-Bergius-Ring 22
97076 Würzburg
Tel. +49 931 4104-0