A Comparison of Experimental High lrradiance and Standard SAE Weathering Tests for Automotive Exterior Materials

The speed, precision and reproduction of real world effects are the key factors which make an excellent accelerated weathering test. A great deal of time and money is constantly expended by industry in scrutiny of these points to improve the quality of test design. A new approach in accelerated weathering is to test at higher irradiance to increase speed in preference to the use of short wavelength light which does not exist in the natural environment. A new test method and filter system have been developed in order to increase the speed and quality of xenon arc testing. The results obtained from this new test are compared with several currently used test standards and with results obtained from five years of Florida outdoor testing. The results showed that the new test method correlated as well with the Florida tests as the standard methods, with the exception of the L* scale color change.