Stepped Isothermal Method And Stress Rate Accelerated Creep Rupture Tests For Efficient Creep Investigaton Of Engineering Thermoplastics

The use of thermoplastic based fiber reinforced materials in demanding structural applications concerning long-term loading in combination with elevated temperatures and media influences requires comprehensive but experimentally practicable materials characterization. While for the long-term estimation of the time dependent deformation behavior a number of extrapolation methods for creep and creep rupture characterization is available, most of these methods are still rather time consuming. An useful approach for time-efficient creep characterization is the stepped isothermal method (SIM), which primarily was established for fiber and textile materials [1, 2]. The first goal of the present paper was to investigate the applicability of SIM for glass fiber reinforced PA6.6 and PPA materials in the saturated wet state. For this purpose, a specific media cell with an integrated deformation measuring system was built up for creep tests under water immersed test conditions for standard tensile test specimens. Based on the stepwise increased test temperature, the creep deformation was accelerated and subsequently used for the creation of creep modulus master-curve generation in accordance to SIM. Generally, plausible results for the time dependent creep modulus of the materials at 60 °C in wet state were obtained, also in good agreement with the corresponding short-term Young´s modulus values. Further on, a new methodical approach for the estimation of the long-term creep rupture behavior was developed. The established stress rate accelerated creep rupture test method (SRCR) allows for very time-efficient creep rupture estimation based on a series of stress rate dependent tests at various initial load levels. In the present study, this method was successfully implemented on glass fiber reinforced PPA materials. The time dependent creep rupture strength was obtained over a time range up to more than 5 years, also in good agreement with the results of additionally performed conventional creep rupture tests.