Failure, viscoelastic

A void nucleation and growth fracture model embedded in a general viscoelastic-plastic material model is representative of approaches to ductile dynamic fracture (Davison et al., 1977 Kipp and Stevens, 1976). Other approaches include employing the plastic strain as a damage variable (Johnson and Cook, 1985) so that both spall and large strain-to-failure can be treated. 

Micro-mechanical processes that control the adhesion and fracture of elastomeric polymers occur at two different size scales. On the size scale of the chain the failure is by breakage of Van der Waals attraction, chain pull-out or by chain scission. The viscoelastic deformation in which most of the energy is dissipated occurs at a larger size scale but is controlled by the processes that occur on the scale of a chain. The situation is, in principle, very similar to that of glassy polymers except that crack growth rate and temperature dependence of the micromechanical processes are very important. 

An investigation of the mechanism of adhesive failure of polydimethylsiloxane elastomers was conducted [75]. The study showed that the total adhesive failure energy could be decomposed into energies for breaking chemical bonds, breaking physical bonds and deforming the bulk viscoelastic elastomer. 

The typical viscoelastic response, as shown in Fig. 2.18, is the propagation of a shock due to the compression, followed by a relaxation to an equilibrium state. The relaxation response is a significant part of the total response. Relaxation times are typically in the 0.1 /is regime. At pressures over about 2 GPa, PMMA shows a change in relaxation time which may be indicative of mechanical failure. Anderson has recently extended this work to other polymers and found similar strong viscoelastic behavior [92A01]. 

Failure can be considered as an actual rupture (stress-rupture) or an excessive creep deformation. Correlation of stress relaxation and creep data has been covered as well as a brief treatment of the equivalent elastic problem. The method of the equivalent elastic problem is of major assistance to designers of plastic products since, by knowing the elastic solution to a problem, the viscoelastic solution can be readily deduced by simply replacing elastic physical constants with viscoelastic constants. 

Some viscoelasticity results have been reported for bimodal PDMS [120], using a Rheovibron (an instrument for measuring the dynamic tensile moduli of polymers). Also, measurements have been made on permanent set for PDMS networks in compressive cyclic deformations [121]. There appeared to be less permanent set or "creep" in the case of the bimodal elastomers. This is consistent in a general way with some early results for polyurethane elastomers [122], Specifically, cyclic elongation measurements on unimodal and bimodal networks indicated that the bimodal ones survived many more cycles before the occurrence of fatigue failure. The number of cycles to failure was found to be approximately an order of magnitude higher for the bimodal networks, at the same modulus at 10% deformation [5] ... 

Most pigmented systems are considered viscoelastic. At low shear rates and slow deformation, these systems are largely viscous. As the rate of deformation or shear rate increases, however, the viscous response cannot keep up, and the elasticity of the material increases. There is a certain amount of emphasis on viscoelastic behavior in connection with pigment dispersion as well as ink transportation and transformation processes in high-speed printing machines (see below). Under periodic strain, a viscoelastic material will behave as an elastic solid if the time scale of the experiment approaches the time required for the system to respond, i.e., the relaxation time. Elastic response can be visualized as a failure of the material to flow quickly enough to keep up with extremely short and fast stress/strain periods. 

This document gives definitions of terms related to the non-ultimate mechanical behaviour or mechanical behaviour prior to failure of polymeric materials, in particular of bulk polymers and concentrated solutions and their elastic and viscoelastic properties. 

The composition, density, thermal properties mechanical properties (elastic, viscoelastic failure behavior) of these mock explosives are given in Ref 7... 

The uniaxial failure envelope developed by Smith (95) is one of the most useful devices for the simple failure characterization of many viscoelastic materials. This envelope normally consists of a log-log plot of temperature-reduced failure stress vs. the strain at break. Figure 22 is a schematic of the Smith failure envelope. Such curves may be generated by plotting the rupture stress and strain values from tests conducted over a range of temperatures and strain rates. The rupture locus moves counterclockwise around the envelope as the temperature is lowered or the strain rate is increased. Constant strain, constant strain rate, and constant load tests on amorphous unfilled polymers (96) have shown the general path independence of the failure envelope. Studies by Smith (97) and Fishman (29) have shown a path dependence of the rupture envelope, however, for solid propellants. 

Majerus (61, 62) has approached the failure behavior of highly filled polymers by a thermodynamic treatment in which the ability to resist rupture is related to the propellant s ability to absorb and dissipate energy at a certain rate. An energy criterion which requires failure to be a function of both stress and strain was originally stated by Griffith (36) for brittle materials and later adapted to polymers by Rivlin and Thomas (80). Williams (115) has applied an energy criterion to viscoelastic materials such as solid propellants where appropriate terms are included for viscous energy dissipation. 

Other coordinate systems may be used for failure surface representations in addition to stress space. Blatz and Ko (11) indicate that either stress (Stress space is most commonly used because the failure surface concept was originally applied to metals, for which stress and strain are more simply related. Viscoelastic materials, on the other hand, may show a multitude of strain values at a given stress level, depending on test conditions. 

The TS of the compacted samples was determined by transverse compression with a custom-built tensile tester. Tensile failure was observed for all the rectangular compacts when compressed between flat-faced platens at a speed ranging between 0.006 and 0.016 mm/sec. Platen speed was adjusted between materials to maintain a time constant of 15 2 seconds to account for viscoelastic differences the constant is the time between the sample break point and when the measured force equals Fbreak/e in the force versus time profile, where the denominator is the mathematical e. Specially modified punch and die sets permitted the formation of square compacts with a centrally located hole (0.11 cm diameter) that acted as a stress concentrator during tensile testing. This capability permitted the determination of a compromised compact TS and thus facilitated an assessment of the defect sensitivity of each compacted material. At least two replicate determinations were performed for each mechanical testing procedure and mean values are reported. 

The above observations enable a qualitative relation, based upon the role of crack tip blunting, to be postulated between the fracture behaviour and the viscoelastic yield behaviour of the materials1 8- 44,45). The basis for this relationship is the idea that crack-tip blunting decreases the local crack tip stress concentration and thus higher applied loads are required to cause failure. 

Bartenew, G. M., Zugev, Y. S. Strength and failure of viscoelastic materials, London-New York Pergamon Press 1968 (transl. from Russian)... 

TG-DTA Characterisation of carbon black [149], flammability evaluation [64], polymer degradation studies [65], ageing studies [70-72], product control [77, 81], combustion performance [83], safety evaluation [83], antioxidation activity [68], pyrolysis of rubbers [82], thermal stability [67, 69, 76, 77], interfacial junctions in viscoelastic composites [78], weathering [72], vulcanisation [73], oxidative behaviour [79], materials evaluation [80], failure analyses [81],... 

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