The fracture mechanics of slow crack growth in polyethylene

✍ Scribed by N. Brown; X. Lu

• Publisher: Springer Netherlands
• Year: 1995
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 262 KB
• Volume: 69
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1573-2673
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00037385

✦ Synopsis

The following theoretical equation was obtained for the rate of initiation 6 of slow crack growth in polyethylene:

where tr = applied stress, K = stress intensity, 7 = Poisson's ratio, E = Young's modulus, trc = stress to produce a craze, try = yield point, d = primordial thickness of the craze and r/= the intrinsic viscosity of the fibrils of the craze. The dependence of ~ on K agrees with the experimental data. The experimental values of~ vary by a factor of 10 7 depending on the type of polyethylene. This large variation in 6 is directly related to intrinsic viscosity ,/ which evolved from the theory.