I have a couple moving boxes full of chromatography tubes that a friend of mine found in storage while cleaning his house. He said that he didn't need them so he gave them to me since he would throw them out otherwise. So I did some research on the contents of the tubes and found that some contained activated coconut charcoal, and others contained either activated silica, or a crosslinked polystyrene named "XAD-2". I also figured out that they are all 8 years old. I read online that chromatography tubes have expiration dates, but only because of rotational cycle of inventory and not because of the contents of the tubes going bad. So my question is, do chromatography tubes actually expire? I know for a fact that regular activated charcoal and activated silica don't actually expire as long as they aren't exposed to the atmosphere and can be reused by reactivation. These are the various tube types that I have:
| ORBO 100 Carbotrap B (20/40), 350/175 mg |
| ORBO 91 Carbosieve-SIII specially treated (60/80), 130/65 mg |
| ORBO 402 Tenax TA specially treated (35/60), 100/50 mg |
| ORBO 101 Carbotrap B (20/40), 100/50 mg |
| ORBO 609 Amberlite XAD-2 (20/50) 400/200 mg |
| ORBO 42 Small Supelpak-20 specially treated Amberlite XAD-2 (20/40), 66/33 mg |
| ORBO 78 HBr on Carboxen 564 specially cleaned (20/45), 400/200 mg |
| ORBO 47 Amberlite XAD-7 specially treated, 100/50 mg |
| ORBO 615 Amberlite XAD-7 (15/50), 60/30 mg |
| ORBO 506 Activated Silica Gel (45/60) 300/150 mg |
| ORBO 92 Carboxen 564 (20/45), 160/80 mg |
| ORBO 351 4-TBC on Activated Coconut Charcoal (20/40), 100/50 mg |
| ORBO 43 Supelpak-20 specially treated Amberlite XAD-2 (20/40), 100/50 mg |
| ORBO 613 Amberlite XAD-4 80/40 mg |
| ORBO 90 Carboxen 564 (20/45), 160/80 mg |
| ORBO 507 Silica Gel (20/40), 520/260 mg |
| ORBO 42 Large Supelpak-20 specially treated Amberlite XAD-2 (20/40), 100/50 mg |
| ORBO 53 Activated Silica Gel (20/40) specially cleaned, 400/200 mg with Glass Fiber Filters |
| ORBO 502 Activated Silica Gel (20/45) 100/50 mg |
| ORBO 60 FLORISIL purified/deactivated (30/45), 100/50 mg |
| ORBO 32 Large Activated Coconut Charcoal (20/40), 400/200 mg |
| ORBO 52 Large Activated Silica Gel (45/60) 150/150 mg |
| ORBO 32 Small Activated Coconut Charcoal (20/40), 100/50 mg |
| ORBO 34 Activated Coconut Charcoal specially treated (20/40), 400/200 mg |
| ORBO 44Supelpak-20 specially treated Amberlite XAD-2 (20/40), 100/50 mg |
