As the complete development of the MCPVT would take several years, it was decided to investigate whether it would be possible to combine the existing PVT's into one harmonized PVT with not too much effort. In first instance, the representatives from the Netherlands and Sweden would carry out this work.
Second meeting
The working group met again in March 1998.
Concerning the open PVT, a paper comparing the particulars of the existing tests was presented by the Swedish representative. It was agreed that the best way forward was to identify those organic peroxide and self-reactives which had given different test results in the past and to test a sample from the same batch in each test. In order to investigate the influence of the different test conditions, it was decided to run the tests under different conditions, e.g. the Dutch PVT equipped with the US sample cup, and the US PVT with the Dutch heating rate. The experimental work is scheduled to start in the autumn of 1998.
Regarding the MCPVT, a Japanese proposal suggested the following test conditions：
It was agreed to start round-robin testing with the MCPVT. Before the start of the round-robin programme, the following items need to be agreed on：
- substance to be tested;
- test conditions;
- how the maximum heating rate is defined and measured;
- reproducibility check;
- how the test results are assessed.
If the MCPVT in future is going to replace one or more of the series E tests, it is essential that criteria need to be selected to sentence the existing classification criteria in the same way as present. The representative from Japan promised to study this further.
