CREEP CRACK-GROWTH TESTING OF PLASTICS - II - DATA-ACQUISITION, DATA REDUCTION AND EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS

To perform fracture mechanical tests under long-term static lending co nditions at varying temperatures and in different environments, severa l test systems and a test procedure were developed and implemented The test systems consist of a lending unit for a wide range of load level s and specimen geometries, an environmental chamber, the equipment for temperature control and devices for the measurement of crack lengths and crack opening displacements. A unique feature of these rest system s is that crack growth and creep behaviour under static loads for a wi de range of materials can be simultaneously characterised in one singl e test. While Part I of this paper describes the test system design an d various test configurations, Part II is concerned with the data acqu isition and reduction scheme and also provides experimental results of creep crack growth tests with plastics. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd , All rights reserved.