Ultra-drawing of high molecular weight polyethylene cast from solution

Summary Hot drawing of high molecular weight polyethylene ( ) was studied. It was found that solutioncast films exhibited a drastically increased drawability in comparison with melt-crystallized material. This phenomenon, which enabled the production of polyethylene structures with a Young's modulus of 108 GPa and a strength of 3.0 GPa, is discussed in terms of a reduced number of entanglements in solution-crystallized material related to melt-crystallized films.With 2 figures and 1 table