Sward-type hardness rocker instruments have been used by the coatings industry for more than a half a century as a nondestructive test instrument to measure cure and ultimate surface hardness of organic coatings (see Refs. (1) through (11)). An accepted standard test method for the use of such an instrument is long overdue.

In previous task group work designed to establish an ASTM method for measuring hardness of organic coatings with Sward-type hardness rocker instruments, round-robin test results continually showed poor interlaboratory reproducibility. This lack of interlaboratory agreement could have resulted from dimensional variations among instruments, with the contact rocker rings as the most likely offender in that regard. There are several producers of Sward-type hardness rockers making instruments that differ among themselves in net weight and ring radius. Some of them exceed the measurements and net weight called for in this test method.

This test method, however, is useful within laboratories to quickly screen and measure the surface hardness of candidate coatings.