Studies on the growth of voids in amorphous glassy polymers

Numerical studies are presented of the localized deformations around voids in amorphous glassy polymers. This problem is relevant for polymer–rubber blends once cavitation has taken place inside the rubber particles. The studies are based on detailed finite element analyses of axisymmetric or planar cell models, featuring large local strains and recent material models that describe time-dependent yield, followed by intrinsic softening and …