The Compression of Bonded Rubber Disks

Abstract

Abstract Compressive stress-strain measurements are reported for bonded disks of natural rubber having shape factors (= d/4t, where d is the diameter and t the thickness) ranging from 0.87 to 12.95. The data are compared to various models for compressed rubber, utilizing the tensile and bulk moduli determined for this material. We find that for thin disks, the measured stiffness is less that the theoretical predictions by roughly a factor of two. A similar discrepancy was found previously, both for elastomers and semi-crystalline polymer films. However, for smaller aspect ratios, the difference between experiment and theory is less than the measurement error.