Tensile Response and the Associated Post: Yield Heating of Polycarbonate

Abstract

It is well known that amorphous polymers, such as polycarbonate (PC), will exhibit adiabatic heating due to the large plastic work that occurs when undergoing significant plastic deformation. However the extent of adiabatic heating has not been investigated with respect to strain rate, with full-field temperature measurements performed on the specimen during deformation. In this study, ASTM tensile dog bone PC specimens were used to investigate the rate-dependent mechanical response from quasi-static to intermediate (~10 s⁻¹) strain rates using a traditional servo-hydraulic load frame. To determine the variations in yield and post-yield response at different locations of the gage area of the specimen, digital image correlation was used to measure the full-field surface strains. In addition, an InSb thermal camera was used concurrently to measure the full-field temperature distribution in the gage area during the deformation. The material experienced non-uniform heating as high as 50–70 °C, and showed significant rate sensitive mechanical response. In this paper, the experimental techniques and results are discussed.