Journal Papers Published by the Rubber Research Group

"Application of fracture mechanics for the fatigue life prediction of carbon black filled elastomers"

Author(s): J.J.C. Busfield, A.G. Thomas and M.F. Ngah

Journal: Constitutive Models for Rubber. Edited by A. Dorfmann and A. Muhr. pp. 249-256.

An attempt to predict the fatigue life of carbon black filled elastomer test pieces using a fracture mechanics approach is made. The fatigue failure of a tensile test specimen is predicted, using cut growth behaviour determined from a pure shear crack-growth test. This is done initially for specimens that contain centre edge cracks cut with a razor to a specified known size and then for normal materials without these initial flaws already introduced. To do this, it is necessary to make an estimate of the size of the initial flaws present in the elastomer. Using sensible estimates for the initial flaw size, permits a far better life prediction analysis to be made than is possible using the traditional S-N technique. It is also noted that to be generally applicable a wide range of flaw sizes and geometries need to be evaluated.

Related site: http://www.materials.qmul.ac.uk/rubber