Characterization of toughness variation due to intrinsic defects in high-thermal-resistant poly(acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene) (ABS)

Abstract

A mechanical testing method, named TACL test, is proposed to characterize the effect of gel-like particles on mechanical properties of high-thermal-resistant poly(acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene) (ABS). The TACL test introduces cracks in the vicinity of gel-like particles by cyclic loading. Mechanical properties are then measured using the cyclically loaded specimens under monotonic tension. Preliminary results show that the mechanical properties, especially the maximum elongation and the total absorbed energy, are very sensitive to the cyclic loading. The study suggests that the TACL test can serve as a means to “semi-quantitatively” characterize number and distribution of the gel-like particles, which is useful for monitoring batch-dependent toughness variation of the ABS.