There has been some misunderstanding about the intent of ASTM E74—“Standard practice of calibration of force-measuring instruments for verifying the force indication of testing machines.” When it was written back in 1974, the standard’s intent was to establish calibration traceability back to primary standards laboratories. This article offers some insight into the calibration procedure as outlined in ASTM E74-13a.

Anyone calibrating in accordance with the ASTM E74 standard should first purchase a full copy of the standard here. The major calibration steps include stabilization, preparation, the calibration procedure itself, and data analysis. Let’s look at each in turn.

Stabilization

There are two steps to the stabilization process:
1. Allow the unit under test (UUT) to come to room temperature. This is size-dependent and can take 24 to 48 hours.
2. Warm up the instrumentation. We recommend 20 to 30 minutes for electrical stabilization of the equipment.

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