Life span of an HP Calculator

[HPing]

We worked in sporting goods in the Voyager era. Plastics and coatings for consumer goods seemed to be innovating rapidly in the 1980s and the makers saw a variety of unexpected failures, some recalled some not recalled.

Some of this seemed to be: poorly-developed chemical engineering, bad raw materials, bad production batches, colour/coatings incompatibilities, unexpected chemical reactions, accelerated deterioration from exposure to light, "air", moisture, variable temperatures, chemical fumes... Some of the failures were never figured out.

We sensed that a lot of the problems were ironed out by the early 1990s.

Generally speaking, where and how equipment was stored seemed to be the major factor for longevity. Dark, dry, cool space away from household chemicals seemed ideal for sporting goods, generally. YMMV.