The essential work of fracture (EWF) test can help improve the performance of polyethylene blown films. These ductile materials are believed to fail by plastic deformation followed by propagation of a crack through the rearranged plastic. Their ductility transforms type Mode III deformations into Mode I type deformations, as in the Elmendorf Tear test, which provides empirical information on the toughness of blown films. In this way, the EWF test can be used to study the toughness of polyethylene blown films. However, the test was limited, which limited its utility to studying films with significant differences in molecular architecture, i.e., large differences in molecular weight and comonomer content (MI and densities). Improvements to the testing removed these limitations. We used the improved testing to explore effects of resin molecular architectures, processing conditions and variations in the film’s fabric on the performance of polyethylene blown films. We examined the rearrangement of the film’s crystalline morphology during deformation and the performance of packaging seals. In this presentation, we review the test, improvements and applications to PE blown films.

Essential work of fracture of m-LLDPE blown films

256th National Meeting (2018)

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