Correlation of outdoor exposure and accelerated weathering test for study of service lifetime of plastic cards

Abstract

A number of commercial plastic card materials, such as polyvinyl chloride (unplasticized) (PVC), polycarbonate (PC) and polyethylene terephthalate glycol (PETG), are widely available for using as smart card body. Usually, the degradation of plastic materials is concerned because the life time of smart card is required to specify. The study of plastic card degradation by moisture, light, and temperature with outdoor exposure and accelerated weathering test in Thailand has to the authors’ knowledge never been studied. Therefore, this study aims to correlate the outdoor exposure condition with the condition in accelerated weathering tester or QUV. The outdoor exposure periods were set at 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 months. Accelerated weathering test was performed by QUV accelerated weathering tester. QUV accelerated weathering tester was operated with both UV-B lamps irradiance and dark light at 0.48 W/m² 340 nm for 4 hours at 37°. The results show that introduction of outdoor exposure and accelerated weathering test causes changing in gloss at 60°, total color different value, thermal properties and mechanical properties. Finally, the results were summarized for correlation condition between the outdoor exposure and the accelerated weathering test.