Fractography of Rubbery Materials

In spite of the best efforts of technologists, rubber components fail in service from time to time. In some cases replacement of a particular item serves the purpose, but in others the failure may lead to serious consequences involving financial loss, environmental contamination or loss of life. The fractographer is required to establish the root causes in terms of design, choice, and quality of material, and to determine the mechanism of failure based on the nature/details or appearance of fracture surfaces. It is the purpose of the present book to treat under a single title the morphology of fracture surfaces obtained from tear, fatigue, abrasion and combinations of these. The book attempts to analyse fracture surfaces of simple rubber and rubber components and to correlate the failure/strength properties with the morphology of fracture surface. Although there is literature coming out from every corner of the world on fracture surface morphology, there is no single book devoted to this important class of material, namely rubber. Needless to say a similar attempt in the field of metallurgy has solved many intricate problems which are beyond the reach of simple mathematical analysis. The first six chapters deal with simple rubber and rubber-based com posites failed under controlled mode, namely, tensile, tear, fatigue, and abrasion. The remaining four chapters deal with the failure of rubber products and, hence, involve complicated analyses. As such, this book may serve as a guideline for further development of the subject in this field.