Modified Burgers-Reimschuessel model for moisture-sensitive polymers

Viscoelastic properties of moisture-sensitive polymers can be significantly affected by moisture in the ambient environment, resulting in drastic changes in the properties as the absorbed moisture content increases. In this article, a simple yet important modification to the Reimschuessel model is introduced by considering both plasticization and anti-plasticization induced by water molecules. The proposed model is validated against the results of four different polymers obtained by Onogi et al., which demonstrates its capability of describing the available data. This model can be used to estimate the performance and service life of products produced using moisture-sensitive polymers. It also reveals that small amounts of diffused moisture might have a stiffening effect on the mechanical properties of hydrophilic polymers.