Long-Term Studies of Rubber Materials by Dynamic Mechanical Stress Relaxation

Abstract

Abstract The measurement of dynamic stress relaxation can reveal otherwise hidden weaknesses in rubber materials. The stress relaxation of the minimum of the restoring foce has the undesirable characteristic of being greater than the continuous stress relaxation. An increase in the amplitude of the deformation increases the decay in the minimum values of the varying retractive stress, and an increase in the prestrain makes it smaller. The normalized curve for continuous stress relaxation is found to lie somewhere between the normalized curves for the maximum and minimum of the retractive stress. The measurement of network density on specimens aged under continuous and dynamic stress relaxation indicate that the mechanism behind the degradation of the rubber network is the same in both cases. The relations between intermittent, continuous, and dynamic stress relaxation give a reasonable estimate of the dynamic stress relaxation from the other two when proper values of the coefficients are used. This relation says that results both of continuous and intermittent stress relaxation are important for predicting the life time of a dynamic seal. The relations offers an explanation of the differences between maximum and minimum values obtained during the measurement of dynamic stress relaxation and their relation to continuous stress relaxation. From these relations it can be concluded that a rubber intended for dynamic seals should contain neither reversion nor secondary crosslinking. Crosslink density should be high in order to overpower effects on crosslinking of factors in the surroundings.