ABSTRACT
Ageing of polymers is of great economic and ecologic importance. When elastomeric components such as tyres, conveyor belts, damping elements, hoses or seals suddenly fail earlier as expected during the service life, often, great secondary damage generates. To prevent such a damage, in many practical applications, components are replaced before they collapse after a certain period of use. Here, one must know the material behavior under the conditions of the practical use. Otherwise, the component replacement can be too early or too late. A second aspect of saving resources and money is the general enhancement of the ageing resistance of the elastomer materials with respect to the application conditions. Therefore, from the viewpoint of the material science, the task must be material development and optimization. For this, the properties of the (new) materials including the ageing resistance must be characterized experimentally in a suitable way. However, the experimental characterization of the ageing resistance is often a very long and expensive way.
