Ray-Ran – FD-A2 Advanced Floor Mounted Falling Dart Tester

Brought to you by Ray-Ran, our plastics and polymers testing specialist brand, our falling dart tester measures the energy that causes thin flexible materials to fail. In fact, it’s never been easier to perform a falling dart test on materials including plastic film, paper and composite sheets. 

Manual testing typically requires at least sixty drops per sample to gain reliable results! But our microprocessor fitted drop dart device uses the latest in photocell technology to eliminate this wasted time and effort. 

What is the falling dart test method?

Also known as the drop dart impact test, this is a straightforward and efficient way to test the impact strength or toughness of films. A dart tester like the FDA2 does this by dropping a free-falling drop dart before recording the resulting effect on a film, which is clamped in place. 

International drop dart compliance – as standard 

You can rely on our industry-leading dart tester to measure a material’s impact resistance to international standards including: 

• ASTM D1709 
• ASTM D4272 
• ISO 7765-1

Simple, multi-purpose drop dart testing

Our drop dart device is built with simple operation in mind. It’s highly accurate and comes supplied with a floor mounted stand. This falling dart tester is ideal for product development and quality control within production, R&D labs, and teaching institutions. 

Securing drop dart success  

The two-piece pneumatic clamping system of our drop dart device holds your samples firmly in place. It creates a constant tension across the surface area of the specimen to ensure falling dart test repeatability.  

Telescopic drop dart testing 

You can choose the height of your falling dart test to meet the requirements of the international standard you’re working towards. The FDA2 dart tester can be set as low as 660mm and as high as 1.5m. The pneumatically actuated drop dart release mechanism triggers a solenoid valve for increased accuracy.  

A dart tester built for safety 

We designed and built all of our dart testers with your safety in mind. For example, you’ll need to use both hands to release the drop dart and our machine comes with a fully electrical interlocked guard. These safety features protect you from falling and rebounding darts. Plus, the drop dart return shoot helps you to retrieve the dart without the risk of injury after each test. 

Touch-button drop dart testing 

Select the falling dart test type at the touch of a button. Then set the testing parameters including drop height, drop dart weight and sample size to meet the required testing conditions.  

Crystal clear drop dart data 

Our dart tester has a large on-board liquid crystal display (LCD) screen. It gives you clear, simple on-screen instructions. Using the reactive alpha / numeric membrane keypad you can program your falling dart test parameters and store them in operator lists for the future. 

Automatic dart tester calibration

Before each batch of tests commences your helpful falling dart tester conducts a simple but important calibration check.  

A wealth of falling dart test statistics  

A batch of falling dart test statistics including the mean, standard deviation and coefficient of variation are automatically updated after each test. You can also define ‘high’ and ‘low’ limits to instantly reflect if the material is a pass or fail. 

Fully downloadable drop dart data

Each dart tester comes with Ray-Ran’s Techni-Test Windows based PC software. You can transfer your drop dart data to your computer in graphical and tabular format for easy analysis using a mini-USB or Ethernet connection. Test results can then be saved and exported to Microsoft Excel in tabular form.  

A dart test portfolio to fall for!

Across the IP portfolio we make a wide range of falling dart test devices and products. Our customers have been equally impressed with the Manual Advanced Falling Dart Impact Testers as well as the Pneumatically Operated Test Sample Cutting Presses we make for perfect specimen preparation.  

Let’s talk about falling dart tests 

We’ve learnt a thing or two about drop dart testing over the decades and we like to share our knowledge. For example, we’ve written this article on carrying out falling dart impact tests to ASTM D1709 standards and produced this video which shows one of our falling dart test machines in action.