Tensile Strength Statistics of High-Performance Mono- and Multifilament Polymeric Materials: On the Validity of Normality

Abstract

Recently, the statistical distributions of the mechanical properties, including tensile strength (σ), of several high-strength high-modulus oriented polymeric materials have been analyzed by employing the Weibull’s and Gaussian statistical models. However, a more detailed comprehensive analysis of the distributions of the mechanical properties of these materials aimed to estimate the validity of normality by employing some other statistical approaches, is needed. In the present work, the σ statistical distributions of the seven high-strength oriented polymeric materials based on the polymers with three different chain architectures and conformations, ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene (UHMWPE), polyamide 6 (PA 6), and polypropylene (PP), each in the form of both single and multifilament fibers, have been investigated using graphical methods, such as the normal probability and quantile–quantile plots, and six selected formal normality tests, such as the Kolmogorov–Smirnov, Shapiro–Wilk, Lilliefors, Anderson–Darling, D’Agostino–K squared, and Chen–Shapiro tests. It has been found that the conformity of the σ distribution curves to the normal distribution, including the linearity of the normal probability plots, for the materials with lower strengths (σ < 1 GPa, quasi-ductile PA 6- and PP-based materials) is more correct as compared to those for the materials with markedly higher strengths (σ > 4 GPa, quasi-brittle UHMWPE-based materials). The impact of the sample type (single or multifilament fibers) on this behavior turned out to be negligible.