STRAIN-RATE AND TEMPERATURE EFFECTS ON THE NON-LINEAR BEHAVIOR AND THE DAMAGE PROCESS-INDUCED BY TENSILE LOADING WITHIN RTPMMA RUBBER-TOUGHENED POLYMETHYLMETHACRYLATE

Rubber toughened polymers ''RTP'', when they are used in structural el ements to ensure absorption energy gives better results than those of glassy polymers which generally behave in brittle manner. The aim of t his work is to investigate the strain rate and temperature effects on the non lineaire behaviour of RTPMMA. Furthermore, we used a macroscop ical approach to characterize the damage process induced by tensile lo ading on a special dumbell shape specimen. Compared to the results obt ained by an other technique used by SCHIRRER [1], this method seems to be a promising one to the characterization of damage.