W. CONSHOHOCKEN, Pa. — The American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) hardware-based weathering Standards G 23, G 26 and G 53 are slated to be withdrawn by December 2000 and should be replaced with improved, performance-based Standards G 151 through G 155.

The new documents, which have been available since 1997 and have received minor revisions this year, were created by a task group of Subcommittee G03.03 on Simulated and Controlled Exposure Tests in Committee G-3 on Weathering and Durability.

“The intention was to change the documents from being specific to a particular hardware configuration or particular test apparatus, to a performance-based approach, where instead of describing a piece of hardware, we describe what the device must do,” said Patrick Brennan of Q-Panel Lab Products, Ohio, who co-chairs the task group with Warren Ketola of 3M.