Face Shields

[Sideways]

Those Clearmax visors look interesting, what is the impact rating of them? EN166-B or EN166-f?

I wonder how many people observe the shelf life advice on their visors and replace them when needed. Most manufacturers seem to state 2-3 years shelf life for their products. I use the Honeywell bionic visors and those have a 2 year life.

EN175 - B, medium impact, 6mm ball upto 120m/ sec

For my personal use, I disregard any recommended shelf life on polycarbonate. It doesn't go off sitting in the box or inside your garage. It deteriorates due to UV exposure, chemicals and of course it scratches pretty easily.
In careful use, it will not deteriorate before I replace it due to the inevitable scratches that impair visibility and I will get a much longer
lifetime than 2 years if I can avoid the scratches.

 

[Paul Hannaby]

When I was researching life spans of visors, one manufacturer quoted a max life of 5 years for their product if it wasn't taken out of the box...

Most of us use solvent based finishes so the visors are exposed to fumes and volatile chemicals etc. which may have an adverse effect over time. Obviously it's your head and your choice but the way I look at it is that if I need safety gear, I want a guarantee it's up to the job so I replace mine regularly.

 

[Sideways]

People have a tendency to play safe when required to publish a shelf life or best before date. It's totally understandable but in food hygiene for example, it is recognised to cause massive levels of waste.
In products like motorcycle helmets, many of which use polycarbonate shells, 5 to 7 years from date of manufacture is a common recommendation but is perhaps blamed on ageing of glues and foams, not the shell.
That makes me sceptical of a manufacturer suggesting a 2 year shelf life for PC. In practice, i'll have worn my visor out well before 5yrs so no big deal.
An interesting study that crash tested 650 odd pushbike helmets some as much as 26 years old, found no significant loss of performance due to age and I have some sheets of UV protected polycarb in my shed that carry a 10yr warranty...
It's my head :-D

 

[Paul Hannaby]

In a previous career I knew of a death directly attributable to UV degradation of safety equipment so I'm not going to put either my head or any of my students at risk by playing Russian roulette with PPE. Should an accident ever occur, no doubt my insurers would be quick to absolve themselves of any liability if it turned out the PPE wasn't used in accordance with the manufacturer's recommendations so I follow the guidance supplied.