This part of ISO 4586 establishes a classification system for high-pressure decorative laminated sheets according to their performance and main recommended fields of application, including materials with special characteristics, for example postformability or defined reaction to fire.
This part of ISO 4586 also specifies requirements on the properties of the various types of laminate covered by this classification. For several of the properties, more than one test method for checking the requirements is given. These methods have been included to cover cases where the results given by alternative methods are approximately equivalent, where expensive equipment of different types is already in satisfactory use, or where experience is limited to only one of the methods in certain countries.
Requirements are specified for those types of material that are most generally used, but additional types may be added as required. The limit values specified apply to the most commonly used types of material, but within each classification it may be possible to obtain variants having much higher performance figures.
These materials are characterized by their decorative surfaces, which are relatively hard and resistant to wear, scratching, impact, boiling water, domestic stains and moderate heat. They are intended for interior applications as follows:
-- thin single-faced laminates usually less than thick, for bonding to a substrate;
-- compact laminates, single- or double-faced, approximately to thick, which need to be rigidly supported without necessarily being bonded to a substrate;
-- compact laminates, self-supporting, double-faced, usually thicker than , the thickness of which will be selected according to application and panel dimensions.
The back surface of sheets having only one decorative face is made suitable for adhesive bonding to a substrate.