Influence of artificial thermal ageing on polyester-reinforced and polyvinyl chloride coated AF9032 technical fabric

The presented work deals with the thermal ageing evaluation for polyester-reinforced and polyvinyl chloride coated fabrics. The architectural fabric AF9032 was exposed to artificial thermal ageing by subjecting the material samples to temperature levels of 80℃ and 90℃ for up to 12 weeks. The mechanical properties of the aged fabric have been separately described by the identified linear piecewise model (with assumption of the elastic behavior) and by the Bodner–Partom model (with assumption of the viscoplastic behavior). The evolution of the obtained parameter values for various ageing temperatures and over ageing periods have been approximated by linear functions achieving a good convergence. The simplified methodology of Arrhenius has been incorporated for the extrapolation of functions obtained for 90℃ and consequently used for ageing analysis. For the fill direction, the lines describing evolution of the mechanical parameters over ageing time coincide fully with the ultimate tensile strength and elongation at break and are parallel for the Bodner–Partom model parameters ([Formula: see text]) when comparing results for 80° and 90℃. For the warp direction, the obtained lines concerning mechanical properties and Bodner–Partom parameters exhibit different tendencies (increasing or decreasing) for both temperatures. Thus, the ageing evaluation according to the Arrhenius law has been confirmed by the obtained results only for the fill direction.