Vinyl darkening with age?

[Rooster]

Has anybody ever seen this before? The white portions are darkening as it ages.

Sign is a about 7 years old, the colors are still good, but the underlying vinyl has gone dark.

Sign was printed on 3M 180CV2 and laminated with the matching cast gloss lam and then mounted to an alumabond sheet..

 

[TimToad]

With increasing levels of UV reaching the earth, its hard to imagine it wouldn't start cooking the adhesive in the laminate.

In this day and age, I'd say getting seven years of outdoor exposure is doing pretty good.

 

[Gino]

Kinda like he said. Years ago, when you cleared things, you'd only see the lightest of color do what they called.... BURN. Everything got a kinda yellowish haze to it. The other colors did it too, but you couldn't see it cause it was colors, so it was almost unnoticeable. That was paint. Today, it's vinyl and the vinyl itself, when not printed or only very light passes of color will darken. Same idea, just different products. If it's a southern exposure, this takes place faster than other directions or protected by some means from above. Varnishes and oils aren't being used, so it just gets darker from time and light.

 

[Rooster]

Would doubling up on the lamination help decrease this effect? Assuming it's from the UV light.

 

[T_K]

Considering most vinyl is only rates up to 10 years max (and a lot of them in the 5-10 year range), I'd say 7 years was normal lifespan for a sign. Actually, that's probably past lifespan down here in Texas.

Not sure it'd be worth the money to try doubling up on the laminate. That's just a chance for twice the problems. Plus, you shouldn't expect more than maybe 3 years more from the vinyl itself at most. It'd be better for the customer to have a sinking fund to replace the sign. But that, of course, would require financial planning on their part over the course of several years - and not many people do that.

 

[TimToad]

Would doubling up on the lamination help decrease this effect? Assuming it's from the UV light.

If its possibly the adhesive of the laminate burning, it wouldn't matter how many layers you applied. The top layer's adhesive would always be the first to fail.