How long will polymer really last?

M

mo84

New member
With the increase in gun frames being made of polymer, I wonder just how long they will last. Can we expect the plastic to eventually breakdown and become weak as it ages. I know short term it may not matter, but will they last over 100 years like many steel guns have? With the sheer amount of guns being produced today made of polymer, it would be a shame for them to have a shelf life due to the plastic breaking down, rather than wear and tear. I would also be interested to know how long they have been useing polymer in firearms and if there are any tests that have been conducted to see if what I am talking about might become a reality? thanks
 
If they are treated properly, they will probably last indefinitely. I suspect that polymer guns are subject to UV more than anything else, so if a gun was exposed to excessive amounts of UV it might start to break down. But it would probably need to be A LOT of UV, more than just exposure through regular use. There are guns from the 70's and Glocks with hundreds of thousands of rounds through them that are still fine and functional.
 
A lot of polymers are in fact more durable than many metals. If not subjected to too much UV as someone said, or to extremes of temperature, they should last a long time.

Too many times we tend to think of "plastic" as cheap or inferior... of course I still prefer my metal frames myself. :o
 
They've been digging plastic up in landfills that's been buried in them for years and years. To the point that plastics are plugging up our landfills.
 
When rats and cockroaches evolve and challenge us for supremacy I'll expect them to be wielding poly weapons.

If I were to bury the poly gun of my choice I would expect that when the metal parts had all gone to dust the poly would still be there.
 
Polymer is essentially a "plastic" within a broad definition, and it starts to degrade as soon as it's poured & moulded.
That degradation is a very slow process, and a subject that no maker will address publicly, but the material WILL weaken over time.
Right now, nobody knows how much time. :)

My 1988 Glock 17 is holding up fine, but I would not expect it to be safe to fire in a hundred years. I think 50 would be questionable, but I won't be around to test it.
Denis
 
They've been digging plastic up in landfills that's been buried in them for years and years.
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That's true, but a landfill is the worst place to put anything if you want it to go away. A landfill puts it out of sight but it does not make it go away. A landfill in my area was forced to move about a year ago. They dug the whole thing up. The pulled newspapers from the 1960's, still readable, out of it. Often a landfill is a sealed environment, no oxygen and very slow decomposition. Especially if it is compacted. So a plastic buried deep is much more likely to survive than a plastic staked to the soil surface for 5 years.
 
Depolymerization reactions take place in the presence of heat, light, or radiation. My polymers instructor did research in Germany studying how hot water in PVC pipes expedite the depolymerization process. So keep your AR in a dark, lead-lined freezer and it'll last forever:)
 
Thought I read something somewhere that most or some plastics take 500 years + to biodegrade. Could be wrong though.

Sent from my PB99400 using Tapatalk
 
They've been digging plastic up in landfills that's been buried in them for years and years. To the point that plastics are plugging up our landfills.
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The same is true of anything else. The reason it is called a SANITARY LANDFILL is that they are designed to inhibit decomposition. Not to mention little decomposition occurs in anaerobic conditions found there. As mentioned elsewhere, newspapers from 50 years ago can still be dug up and read.
 
All I know is my polymer guns will out last/out live me and probably most of the members here on the TFL. I remember the 2 guys on Guns & Ammo TV show cooking a XD on the BBQ grill and all that happened was some marks in the grip area from the grate of the grill. Gun did shoot after this test.
 
The reason it is called a SANITARY LANDFILL is that they are designed to inhibit decomposition.
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That is not correct. A sanitary landfill is called such because it is supposed to isolate dangerous materials from contact with people and the environment. Decomposition would be useful and hoped for but because the only way to effectively manage large amounts of waste is to quickly compact and bury it, little decomposition occurs. It is a very poor way of disposing of garbage and the inhibition of decomposition is an unfortunate byproduct of the system, not an intentionally engineered outcome.

Because of the stable temperatures, lack of UV exposure and anaerobic environment, any plastic put there will remain indefinitely. As for chemical attack, pistol polymers are highly resistant to it.
 
DPris + 1

My background is in the "plastics" industry and polymer resins come in different compositions/recipes and thus have different qualities. Cheaper stocks will go first. However, most if not all, will outlive us. There are just too many natural environmental factors that can effect these resins. Some have been mentioned and one that has not, is the composition of the air we breath. .... ;)


Be Safe !!!
 
I think all of these replys are great. I still think I would rather have a steel gun rather than a plastic one, even though I do own a plastic LCP. I guess if I was a gun company looking to make a product as cheep as possible, I would want to use plastic and sell it as something great :rolleyes: The lite weight of plastic has its place though in guns like my LCP so I can only hope it lasts a long long time.
 
Pound for pound, I think the polymers used in handguns actually cost more than firearm-quality alloys, so I don't think of polymer as a "cheap" alternative. Granted, you need less polymer than metal, mass-wise, so I don't actually know which method results in higher material cost.

Where the savings for the manufacturer come in is in the reduced cost of molding/finishing the polymer compared to the cost of machining the alloy. I don't mind manufacturers cutting costs there. If the parts are dimensionally-correct, they're dimensionally-correct. When I hold the gun in my hand, I can't tell whether it took them X hours to get it into its final form or Y hours.

In short, I'd object to a manufacturer cutting costs by using inferior materials, or by relaxing tolerances to make their job easier, but I don't think that simply using polymer instead of metal necessarily implies either of those.
 
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