Fracture toughness and fracture mechanisms of PBT/PC/IM blends PART IV Impact toughness and failure mechanisms of PBT/PC blends without impact modifier

In this part of the series, the impact behaviour of the PBT and PC blends without impact modifier was studied. Failure mechanism of the blends under various conditions was discussed. It was found that the key toughening process, i.e. interfacial debonding-cavitation, was disabled when the blends were subjected to impact loading. Hence, the fracture of the thick PBT/PC specimens with strong interface occurred under plane-strain condition. Their impact toughness obeys the rule of mixtures and synergistic toughening could not be achieved. When thinner specimens were tested, the fracture took place under non-plane-strain condition. But, the toughness of the blends was much lower than the value predicted by the rule of mixtures. Negative blending effect was obtained. Study on the strain rate effect suggests that under impact loading, the PC domains in the blends are subjected to an additional plastic constraint imposed by the neighboring PBT matrix, which is more rigid at a higher strain rate. Since fracture of the PC is highly sensitive to the plastic constraint at the crack-tip, the PBT imposed high plastic constraint promotes brittle fracture of the PC, leading to a deteriorated impact resistance. Evidences from TEM, SEM and OM studies support the mechanism proposed. Based on this mechanism, some suggestions on the selection of polymer components and design of microstructure for rigid-rigid polymer blends are also given.