Biaxial tensile behavior and strength of architectural fabric membranes

The utilization of composite fabric membrane materials for large-span membrane structures has attracted considerable attention in recent decades due to enhanced material properties. Biaxial mechanical properties with respect to real engineering applications are essential and indispensable in comparison with uniaxial ones. This study focuses on true biaxial characteristics of a typical polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF)-coated polyester membrane material in terms of stress-strain characteristics and breaking criteria.The true stress-strain curves obtained from an experimental study, i.e. seven loading ratios on the basis of symmetry and typical conditions, are investigated with digital image correlation method. The interpolation of these curves in combination of least square method achieves a three-dimensional strain surface as a function of warp and weft strains, which is useful to assess reasonable structural behavior. A new breaking criteria intended for architectural fabric membrane is proposed in analogy to Tsai-Hill, Yeh-Stratton and Norris failure criteria. The basic constants in the criteria are determined using experimental results. A comparative analysis between available uniaxial and biaxial criteria shows that the new criteria can cover all criteria due to the fact that biaxial mechanical properties are larger than uniaxial ones. Furthermore, a similar but glued specimen is employed to compare welded specimens. It is obtained that observations, values and curve tendency are similar, demonstrating the suitability of using new specimens to identify true biaxial properties.     

A new constitutive model on biaxial tensile behavior of architectural fabrics

Accurate and concise constitutive model of biaxial tensile behavior is urgently needed for the analysis of complex membrane structure engineering. A new constitutive model is developed to describe the tensile behaviors of coated fabrics from pre-tension to breaking. The shrinkage curve is employed for the first time and stress-ratio dependence coefficient (SDC) is proposed to represent the proportion of elongation and shrinkage in biaxial monotonic tensile test. The deformation of cruciform specimen is considered as the result of the coupling effect of biaxial tension and Poisson effect. Excellent fitting results were obtained between the data points of biaxial tensile test and stress-stress-strain response surface, which R-squares of both warp and weft response surface were 0.995.     

On the large strain deformation behavior of silicone-based elastomers for biomedical applications

The results of a comprehensive mechanical analysis of five silicone-based elastomers are presented. Large strain monotonic tests were performed under uniaxial, strip biaxial and equi-biaxial stress states. Based on the multiaxial experimental data, hyperelastic constitutive models were determined for each material. The small strain elastic modulus ranges from 49 kPa to 1.5 MPa, and the materials show different degrees of non-linearity of their stress-strain response. Data on the time and history dependence allow determining the deviation from the behavior predicted using a non-dissipative hyperelastic constitutive model. Next to representing a guideline for a comprehensive characterization of highly deformable materials, the present results provide data which can be used for the selection of an appropriate material, depending on the specific application. The corresponding models can be used to simulate the performance of each elastomer in applications involving large strains and multiaxial loading states.     

Mechanical properties of fluorinated ethylene propylene (FEP) foils in use for neutrino detector project

The use of fluorinated ethylene propylene (FEP) foils as engineering materials for aerospace, solar thermal collector and neutrino detector applications has attracted considerable attention in recent decades. Mechanical properties are indispensable for analyzing corresponding structural behavior to meet the demands of safety and serviceability. In this paper, uniaxial tensile tests taking into account loading speeds, uniaxial tensile cyclic tests in terms of stress amplitude and loading cycles and creep tests considering loading stress and time were carried out to characterize mechanical properties. For uniaxial tensile properties, elastic modulus, yield stress, breaking strength and elongation were analyzed in detail. It is found that these mechanical properties except breaking elongation increased with loading speeds and that mechanical properties obtained in transverse direction were more sensitive than those obtained in machine direction. For cyclic properties, elastic modulus and ratcheting strain tended to be stable after certain cycles, demonstrating that cyclic elastic moduli were more suitable for analyzing structural behavior than those obtained in uniaxial tensile experiments. For creep properties, apparent strain at 6 MPa suggested that special attention was necessary for analyzing structural behavior if maximum stress was larger than 6 MPa. In general, this study could provide useful observations and values for understanding mechanical properties of FEP foils.     

Using developed creep constitutive model for optimum design of HDPE pipes

Unlike metal pipes, high density polyethylene (HDPE) pipes are not susceptible to erosion and corrosion. However, the most important mechanical feature of the HDPE pipes is that this material creeps even at room temperature. Therefore, it is essential to study the creep behavior of this material in order to develop a model. In this paper, creep behavior of HDPE at different temperature and stress levels has been experimentally studied to obtain the creep constitutive parameters of the material. These parameters are used to predict the creep behavior of different structures such as HDPE pipes. For this purpose, a number of specimens have been machined from industrial manufactured pipe walls. Uniaxial creep tests have been carried out and creep strain curves with time for each test were recorded. Then, a constitutive model is proposed for HDPE based on the experimental data and optimization methods. The results of this model have been compared with the test data and good agreement is observed. The developed constitutive model and reference stress method (RSM) were used to produce graphs which provide optimum creep lifetime and design conditions for HDPE pipes that are subjected to combined internal pressure and rotation. These graphs can facilitate the design process of HDPE pipes.     

Strain fields in adhesively bonded patch repairs of damaged Metallic beams

Most engineering structures will need repairs during their lifetime. Traditional repairs of welding and bolting can be intrusive, causing expensive stops of operation due to fire hazards etc. A promising alternative repair method is “composite patch repairs”. This paper reports an investigation of the structural behavior of patches, which needs to be well understood if the repairs can be used in critical applications.The repair of notched metal I-beams was tested in a four-point bend test. Patches can be well designed by focusing on the interaction between the adhesive joint behavior and the notch tip in the metal. Identifying the onset of nonlinear behavior in the adhesive joint is important to characterize damage development and the limits of use. The onset of nonlinear behavior could be identified by changes in the strain field in the patch close to the adhesive measured experimentally with distributed fiber-optic sensing and analyzed by FE-analysis.     

Micromechanical modeling of the deformation kinetics of semicrystalline polymers

The mechanical behavior of semicrystalline polymers is strongly dependent on their crystallinity level, the initial underlying microstructure, and the evolution of this structure during deformation. A previously developed micromechanical constitutive model is used to capture the elasto‐viscoplastic deformation and texture evolution in semicrystalline polymers. The model represents the material as an aggregate of two‐phase layered composite inclusions, consisting of crystalline lamellae and amorphous layers. This work focuses on adding quantitative abilities to the multiscale constitutive model, in particular for the stress‐dependence of the rate of plastic deformation, referred to as the slip kinetics. To do that, the previously used viscoplastic power law relation is replaced with an Eyring flow rule. The slip kinetics are then re‐evaluated and characterized using a hybrid numerical/experimental procedure, and the results are validated for uniaxial compression data of HDPE, at various strain rates. A double yield phenomenon is observed in the model prediction. Texture analysis shows that the double yield point in the model is due to morphological changes during deformation, that induce a change of deformation mechanism. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 49: 1297–1310, 2011     

A nonlinear uniaxial stress-strain constitutive model for viscoelastic membrane materials

Membrane materials with the excellent thermal, optical, electrical and chemical properties have attracted significant attention in numerous research fields recently. However, while being used to construct the membrane structures, the mechanical behaviors of membrane materials are more foundational than the other properties in evaluating the structure safety. This paper thus proposes a nonlinear stress-strain constitutive model for revealing the viscoelastic behaviors of membrane materials under uniaxial tensile loading. To this end, the constitutive equations for expressing the uniaxial tensile stress-strain relationships of viscoelastic materials are established gradually from the kinematic equations of the generalized Maxwell model that includes several basic Maxwell models and one basic spring element. Meanwhile, the uniaxial tensile tests of two typical viscoelastic membrane materials were carried out in order to examine the proposed constitutive model. The constitutive model parameters of the stress-strain properties of both membrane materials are accurately identified using the least square method. By comparing the true stress-strain curves between experimental results and constitutive models, good agreements with the maximum differences of 4.67% and 3.41% are acquired for the two employed viscoelastic membrane materials, respectively. These observations are able to validate the accuracy and efficiency of this proposed constitutive model in predicting the uniaxial stress-strain behaviors of viscoelastic membrane materials, which are significant in the nonlinear structural analysis of membrane structures.     

Constitutive model and failure locus of a polypropylene grade used in offshore intake pipes

BorECO^®™ BA212E is a polypropylene block co-polymer which has become a common material in the manufacturing of large diameter non-pressurized gravity offshore intake pipelines. These lines are used for transportation of sea water for cooling of petrochemical process plants. The pipe sections are joined by butt heat fusion welding to create the pipeline. Recently a few premature failures of such pipelines have been reported in the field. Hence, there is a need to characterize the constitutive behavior of the pipe and weld material in order to properly design these pipes. The aim of this work is to determine the material constitutive behaviors of the pipe material and the welded joint material. Uniaxial tensile tests of both the pipe and weld joint material are conducted at various strain rates. Both the pipe and weld material show a rather high strain rate dependency, with the weld material having about half the yield strength than that of the pipe material. An analytical constitutive material model is developed for both the pipe and weld material, incorporating the effect of strain rate. The failure locus, expressed in terms of the equivalent plastic strain at failure vs. the stress triaxiality, for both materials is also determined as part of the constitutive model using notched dumbbell specimens. The constitutive model and failure loci for the pipe and weld material are implemented in a finite element model (FEM) and are validated by conducting a series of independent four-point bend experiments on both material types. The validation is carried out by comparing the FEM results of the four-point bend model with the experimental results, which show a rather good agreement.     

Mechanical response of three semi crystalline polymers under different stress states: Experimental investigation and modelling

The mechanical responses of high‐density polyethylene (HDPE), polypropylene (PP) and polyamide 6 (PA 6) were experimentally investigated for a wide range of stress states and strain rates. This was accomplished by testing numerous specimens with different geometries. The uniaxial compression of cylindrical unnotched specimens and the uniaxial tensile behaviour of dumbbell specimens at different strain rates, was determined. A series of biaxial loading tests (combined shear and tension/compression, pure shear, pure tension/compression) using a designed Arcan testing apparatus were also performed. Flat and cylindrical notched specimens with different curvature radii were additionally tested in order to explore a wider range of stress states. The Drucker‐Prager yield criterion was calibrated with a set of experimental data, for which analytical formulae for stresses are available, and then applied to predict the deformation behaviour under different stress states, prior to strain localization. The results of the numerical simulations show that the Drucker‐Prager model can capture the initial elastic range and the post‐elastic response very satisfactorily. For triaxial and biaxial stress states there is a good agreement, however some load‐displacement responses are only satisfactorily described. Deviations observed in the predicted and experimental results are very likely attributed to the third invariant stress tensor, which was not explored in the model calibration. The evolution of stress triaxiality and Lode angle parameters with equivalent plastic strain were extracted and analysed for several specimens. The results show a plastic yielding behaviour sensitive to the stress state, which can be attributed to different combinations of stress triaxialities and Lode angle parameters.     

The relaxation and deformational properties of a carbon-black filled elastomer in biaxial tension

Biaxial stress relaxation data acquired for a carbon-black-filled elastomer are analyzed. Consistent with previously published simple-tension and pure-shear results for this elastomer, the biaxial relaxation behavior is also found to be a separable function of time and strain effects. A departure from separability is observed at the larger strain; this might be a manifestation of strain-induced crystallization. An analysis of the biaxial results together with the earlier reported simple-tension and pure-shear data reveals that the deformational dependence of this elastomer obeys the Valanis—Landel hypothesis up to moderate deformations. The Ogden strain energy function is found to be an excellent analytical representation of all of the multiaxial data. Large relative errors found at small tensile strains between the data and the Ogden fit are attributed to carbon black structural effects.     

Arrested chain growth during magnetic directed particle assembly in yield stress matrix fluids

The process of assembling particles into organized functional structures is influenced by the rheological properties of the matrix fluid in which the assembly takes place. Therefore, tuning these properties represents a viable and as yet unexplored approach for controlling particle assembly. In this Letter, we examine the effect of the matrix fluid yield stress on the directed assembly of polarizable particles into linear chains under a uniform external magnetic field. Using particle-level simulations with a simple yield stress model, we find that chain growth follows the same trajectory as in Newtonian matrix fluids up to a critical time that depends on the balance between the yield stress and the strength of magnetic interactions between particles; subsequently, the system undergoes structural arrest. Appropriate dimensionless groups for characterizing the arresting behavior are determined and relationships between these groups and the resulting structural properties are presented. Since field-induced structures can be indefinitely stabilized by the matrix fluid yield stress and "frozen" into place as desired, this approach may facilitate the assembly of more complex and sophisticated structures.     

Crystal structures and order‐disorder phenomena in polymers

The crystal structure of various polymers, presenting symmetry breaking, is discussed. Owing to the presence of disorder, the crystal structure of polymers is generally described in term of ideal modifications, a limit ordered form, characterized by ideal three‐dimensional order, and a limit disordered form, characterized by the presence of statistical disorder in the packing, while preserving the order in the parallelism of the chains. The real crystalline forms are generally intermediate between the limit ordered and limit disordered models. The occurrence of conformational disorder, which produce defects frozen in the crystals of syndiotactic polypropylene, is analyzed.     

Strain energy function of swollen polybutadiene elastomers studied by general biaxial strain testing

The stress–strain behavior of polybutadiene elastomers with various degrees of swelling is investigated for general biaxial strain. Although a number of previous observations have suggested that the classical neoHookean (NH) model describes the uniaxial data of an elastomer in a highly swollen state, the NH model evidently fails to reproduce the biaxial data. This result indicates that the successful fit of the NH model for the uniaxial data of highly swollen elastomers, which has long been recognized, is superficial. We show that the biaxial data in all of the various swollen states including the neat (unswollen) state are satisfactorily described by an Ogden‐type strain energy function with a single set of parameters. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 48: 721–728, 2010     

Dynamic property and constitutive model of polyvinyl butaral material at high strain rates

The polyvinyl butaral (PVB) interlayer of automotive windshield plays an important role in the protection of both pedestrian and passenger, the mechanical property of PVB material should be in‐depth studied. In this article, the systematical uniaxial tensile experiments of PVB material under high strain rates are conducted, the strain rates range from 125.6 to 3768 s^?1. The results of experiments show that there exists a phenomenon of stress spurt caused by the stress hardening in the final stage of tension, and the strain rate exerts great influence on mechanical property of PVB material. Further, the data fitting basing on Mooney–Rivlin model is carried out, it is found that the fitting results are consistent with the experiment data, which means that the Mooney–Rivlin constitution model can describe the large deformation behavior of PVB material. At last, the rate‐dependent mechanical behavior of the PVB material is further investigated in this article. On the basis of the experiment results and Johnson–Cook model, a rate‐dependent constitutive model is proposed to describe the tensile mechanical property of PVB material under high strain rates. This work will be beneficial to the simulation and analysis of automotive collision safety and pedestrian safety protection, which are related to damage of automotive windshield. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Thermodynamic Model for Gas Adsorption Isotherms

In this paper based on the principle of solution thermodynamics for gas–solid equilibrium, a relation is developed to express gas adsorption isotherms. An activity coefficient model based on weight fraction of sorbate in the solid phase has been derived that well describes the behavior of various gases on different types of adsorbents. The proposed model has been evaluated and compared with four other models commonly used for gas adsorption isotherms in the literature. For 12 different systems at various isotherms for the temperature range −128 to 100°C and the pressure range 0.02 to 1219 kPa for 689 data points, the proposed model predicts equilibrium pressure with an average deviation of 5.3%, which is about half of the error obtained from other methods. The proposed model clearly outperforms other available methods such as the vacancy solution theory, the ideal adsorption solution model, and other various modified forms of the Langmuir isotherm. Unique features of the proposed model are its simplicity, generality, and accuracy over the entire pressure and temperature ranges.     

石墨烯/聚乙烯复合材料及其拉伸性能的分子动力学模拟

利用分子动力学方法,模拟石墨烯/聚乙烯复合材料的微观结构和性能,并采用单轴拉伸模拟方法研究石墨烯/聚乙烯复合材料的拉伸性能.结果表明,在石墨烯/聚乙烯复合材料平衡构型中,聚乙烯基体分子在石墨烯表面处形成多层吸附层,吸附层处于动态稳定状态,层内分子可以发生扩散迁移.吸附层内聚乙烯分子发生"吸附固化"现象,分子弯曲程度减弱,发生有序排列,且在垂直于石墨烯方向的运动性能受到抑制.拉伸模拟结果表明,石墨烯能够提高聚乙烯材料的拉伸性能.在弹性区和屈服区,石墨烯阻碍了复合材料在垂直于拉伸方向的压缩变形,聚乙烯分子"吸附固化"结构保持稳定,引起体系整体应力的迅速升高.在软化区,由于石墨烯发生剧烈弯曲,"吸附固化"结构发生破坏,最终引起体系应力迅速减小.在弹性区和屈服区,体系应变主要引起了非键相互作用的改变.在软化区之后,应变主要导致了体系内分子成键相互作用的改变.应变速率能够提高复合材料的屈服应力,而不改变复合材料应力应变的整体趋势.     

Effect of junction constraints on rubber elasticity in multiaxial states of stress

The strains obtained in an amorphous polymer network subject to multiaxial states of stress are calculated according to a recent molecular theory which takes account of constraints on junctions in real networks. Experimental measurements for biaxial states of stress, for pure shear superposed on tension, and for combined torsion and simple extension, are seen to compare favorably with the predictions of the theory.