Experimental Characterization of Linear Viscoelastic Behavior

The mathematical representation of the elastic behavior of oriented heterogeneous solids can be somewhat improved through a more appropriate choice of the boundary conditions such as proposed by Hashin and Shtrikman [66] and Stern-stein and Lederle [86]. In the case of lamellar polymers the formalisms developed for reinforced materials are quite useful [87—88]. An extensive review on the experimental characterization of the anisotropic and non-linear viscoelastic behavior of solid polymers and of their model interpretation had been given by Hadley and Ward [89]. New descriptions of polymer structure and deformation derive from the concept of paracrystalline domains particularly proposed by Hosemann [9,90] and Bonart [90], from a thermodynamic treatment of defect concentrations in bundles of chains according to the kink and meander model of Pechhold [10—11], and from the continuum mechanical analysis developed by Anthony and Kroner [14g, 99]. 

The comparison of calculated and experimental data of the creep curves showed a good correlation. After comparing the calculated results it can be concluded that the viscoelastic behavior of the technical fabric can be described by the one-integral model. In warp and weft directions the numerical curve fitting resulted in a difference of 3.5-9.9% and 0.3-2.6% respectively. Therefore, the Schapery model with the power function characterized more accurate creep behavior in weft direction than warp direction. Also the power function described the strain evaluation better than the exponential function. This research concluded that both the linear and nonlinear viscoelastic identifications based on different material models can be brought together and the results of linear characterization can be applied to the nonlinear description of the material. 

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