I have a mate who's a Doctor of Chemistry and I asked him ages ago this very question i.e. Is it possible to date the vinyl/styrene of old/new 45's. He said he thought it may be possible BUT as far as he knew it would mean the near destruction of said 45's! At the very least a lump of each 45 would be needed for testing and simply drilling the 45 (like a deletion for example) would heat up and trash the plastic so at the very least a biggish hole would need to be cut out of the label for use in the various aging processes!
Pete's dating thing is very interesting! If it can be done like for example by putting chemicals on the run out groove or summat, that'd be like gold dust! Problem is vinyl & styrene are completely different animals!
On a lighter note, if it could be done, it'd be like a pregnancy testing kit for old vinyl/styrene
We should start a competition for marketing names of a kit like this....any ideas?
One for starters would be the 'HYMElich manoeuvre'....................or just 'The Frederick' for short................i'll get me coat
Cheers
Steve