Peristaltic Pump Tubing Expiration

[Gtinnel]

I was looking for some peristaltic pump tubing online and found a roll of Tygon E-LFL tubing on eBay for cheap, but it’s 4 years past the manufacturers expiration date (which is 2 years from manufacture date).

Does anyone have any experience with old peristaltic tubing, and if so did you have any issues with it? My guess is that they have an expiration date for liability reasons since the stuff is designed for laboratory and medical fields and is probably still usable for a long time after the expiration date.

 

[Frags 2 Fishes]

A few years ago I bought 20 ft of pharmed tubing for my master flex pump. No issues using it and it is likely 6-7 years old now. I think like you stated it's more of a liability issue but as long as the tubing is in good shape should be fine.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Plastics get brittle over time. You may find it doesn’t last as long, but may last long enough to still cost less per day than new tubing.

 

[Gtinnel]

With the price I paid for the tubing for even if the life of the tubing is diminished by half I still got a good deal.
Now I’m curious if there is anyway to tell approximately how much of the stated life of the tubing I actually get. According to the manufacturer with 10psi the tubing will last 600 hours with a 3 roller pump at 600 rpm. So if I am running my 3 roller pump head at 100 rpm could I expect about 6 times the tubing life (in hours)?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

According to the manufacturer with 10psi the tubing will last 600 hours with a 3 roller pump at 600 rpm. So if I am running my 3 roller pump head at 100 rpm could I expect about 6 times the tubing life (in hours)?

I do not know how those things relate, but that would be my first pass approximation.