Sabine Seidler - Böcker

Reliable and meaningful methods of polymer testing are necessary to support the plastics industry, being essential for understanding material and part properties, and evaluating materials for a part design, with important implications for product safety as well as operating conditions and lifetime. This book covers all the most important testing methods, from long-established basic techniques to recent developments, including the latest polymer testing standards.By means of examples for the optimization of materials as well as for the evaluation of part properties, an insight into modern polymer testing and its interdisciplinary character is provided.Included in this third edition is an all-new chapter on the testing of polymer films; additionally, many small updates and corrections have been made throughout the book.Numerous tables and figures are included, providing structures and physico-chemical data. A special section for beginners is dedicated to guiding formulations and test methods. A relatively short section deals with development trends in Europe. Sustainability is a major theme, and it is demonstrated that PVC has a strong potential to develop into a fully sustainable material.Another section deals with the everyday problems in the processing of PVC, such as the formation of specks, photo-effects, and plate-out. Plate-out is a common problem in the processing of PVC but only relatively few publications cover it. The causes, influencing factors, and mechanisms are still poorly understood. This section, unique in the literature, provides assistance in the selection and dosage of raw materials to PVC processor, based on the influencing factors during processing.

The application of fracture mechanics to polymers and composites allows the quantitative description of the toughness behaviour by means of fracture mechan­ ics parameters and enables preventive failure analysis. In recent years this young scientific discipline has developed rapidly, and now the experimental results are looking for more applications in industrial practice. However, the practical appli­ cations of fracture mechanics parameters to structural-integrity assessment are severely restricted owing to their limited transferability from specimens to com­ ponents. Indeed, geometry-independent fracture mechanics parameters are very important for the reliable functioning of polymers and components in nearly all industrial application fields. These application fields include the polymer development, quality control, con­ struction and polymer-specific design of reliable components in the motor indus­ try, the electrical industry and the manufacture of household appliances, as well as applications in information technology and medical applications. The present status report on the deformation and fracture behaviour of polymer materials was composed on the basis of revised lectures presented at the Merse­ burg discussion conference entitled 'Deformation and Fracture Behaviour of Polymers' and additional single contributions. The editors and authors have tried hard to present information about the applied fracture mechanics of polymers and composites in the light of their current re­ search work.

The application of fracture mechanics to polymers and composites allows the quantitative description of the toughness behaviour by means of fracture mechan­ ics parameters and enables preventive failure analysis. In recent years this young scientific discipline has developed rapidly, and now the experimental results are looking for more applications in industrial practice. However, the practical appli­ cations of fracture mechanics parameters to structural-integrity assessment are severely restricted owing to their limited transferability from specimens to com­ ponents. Indeed, geometry-independent fracture mechanics parameters are very important for the reliable functioning of polymers and components in nearly all industrial application fields. These application fields include the polymer development, quality control, con­ struction and polymer-specific design of reliable components in the motor indus­ try, the electrical industry and the manufacture of household appliances, as well as applications in information technology and medical applications. The present status report on the deformation and fracture behaviour of polymer materials was composed on the basis of revised lectures presented at the Merse­ burg discussion conference entitled 'Deformation and Fracture Behaviour of Polymers' and additional single contributions. The editors and authors have tried hard to present information about the applied fracture mechanics of polymers and composites in the light of their current re­ search work.

The sub volumes A of volume VIII/6 form a series of data collections and handbooks covering properties of polymer solids and polymer melts.