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Foz Hughes Thesis This item was submitted to Loughborough University as a PhD thesis by the author and is made available in the Institutional Repository (https://dspace.lboro.ac.uk/) under the following Creative Commons Licence conditions. For the full text of this licence, please go to: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/ The high strain-rate behaviour of polymers and nanocomposites for lightweight armour applications by Foz Hughes Department of Physics Loughborough University Loughborough Leicestershire LE11 3TU United Kingdom ©Foz Hughes 2013 A Doctoral Thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy of Loughborough University Supervisor: Dr. G. M. Swallowe Department of Physics i Acknowledgments My thanks and eternal respect go to my project supervisor, Dr. Gerry Swallowe, for his continuing help and enthusiasm. To my partner, Tracy, and her daughter Allie, your constant help, advice and encouragement has made this so much easier than it would have been without you. I would also like to thank my parents, Jill and Glynne for their support throughout my academic career. My co-conspirator Andy Prudom, who aided and abetted in a huge amount of seemingly ridicu- lous experiments, which yielded fascinating results on many occasions. Finally, a special thank you to all of the administrative and technical staff at Loughbor- ough University who have responded admirably to my numerous unreasonable demands. iii Abstract The need for efficient, lightweight armour solutions has never been so great as it is today. Increasing numbers of personnel, both military and civilian are being placed in an expanding variety of life-threatening situations, and we must recog- nise the responsibility to maximise their combat survivability. One way to help protect these people is to provide them with some form of armour. Advanced polymeric materials are finding an increasing range of industrial and defence applications. These materials have the potential to improve the performance of current armour systems, whilst also reducing their cost and weight. Polymers may be reinforced with the addition of nanofillers such as carbon nanotubes or graphene, to produce nanocomposites, an exciting emerging poly- mer technology. Nanomaterials have been shown to exhibit extraordinary strength, far higher than that of traditional armour materials. Nanocomposites have the pos- sibility of being remarkable materials, with high strength and light weight. The work detailed in this report is an investigation into the mechanical properties of nanocomposites along with some novel blended polymer composites. Two compressive testing techniques have been used to carry out this investi- gation. The intermediate strain-rate Optical Drop-Weight, and the high strain-rate Split-Hopkinson Pressure Bar. The latter required some significant modifications in order to optimise it for use with low-density polymers. Ultimately, nanocomposites were found to behave virtually indistinguishably from the monolithic polymer matrices. Yield strengths and energy absorption characteristics remained inside the ordinary experimental scatter. Blended com- posites, in which a long chain length polymer is combined with a chemically similar polymer with a shorter chain length, proved to be more interesting. Yield strengths of these novel materials were increased over that of either constituent material, although energy absorption remained low. v Contents Acknowledgments iii Abstractv Contents vii List of Figures xiii I Project background1 1 Introduction3 1.1 Armour.................................... 3 1.1.1 A historical perspective...................... 3 1.1.1.1 The rise and fall of traditional armour........ 4 1.1.1.2 Lessons from history .................. 7 1.1.2 Firearms and fire power...................... 7 1.1.2.1 Firearms ......................... 7 1.1.2.2 Explosives ........................ 11 1.1.3 The aetiology of injury....................... 13 1.1.3.1 Firearm trauma ..................... 13 1.1.3.2 Explosive trauma .................... 14 1.1.4 The development of modern armour .............. 14 1.1.4.1 World War I (1914 - 1918). ............... 14 1.1.4.2 World War II (1939 - 1945)................ 16 1.1.4.3 The Cold War (approx. 1947 - 1991).......... 18 1.1.5 Modern threats........................... 19 1.1.5.1 Threats to vehicles.................... 20 1.1.5.2 Threats to personnel................... 22 1.1.6 The future of warfare ....................... 25 1.1.7 Designing the ideal armour.................... 26 1.1.7.1 Personnel armour.................... 27 1.1.7.2 Vehicle armour...................... 28 1.2 Polymers, composites and nanocomposites............... 30 1.2.1 Polymers............................... 30 1.2.1.1 Polyethylene....................... 31 1.2.1.1.1 Low Density Polyethylene (LDPE) . 31 1.2.1.1.2 Linear Low Density Polyethylene (LLDPE) 32 1.2.1.1.3 High Density Polyethylene (HDPE) . 32 vii Contents 1.2.1.1.4 Ultra-High Molecular Weight Polyethylene (UHMWPE) .................. 32 1.2.1.1.5 Dyneema® and Spectra® . 32 1.2.1.2 Polyurea ......................... 33 1.2.2 Composites ............................. 33 1.2.3 Nanomaterials ........................... 34 1.2.3.1 Graphene......................... 34 1.2.3.2 Carbon nanotubes.................... 35 1.2.3.3 Buckminsterfullerene.................. 36 1.2.4 Nanocomposites .......................... 36 1.2.4.1 Intercalated/exfoliated nanoclay ........... 36 1.2.4.2 Carbon black....................... 37 1.2.4.3 Titanium dioxide .................... 37 1.3 The role of polymers in armour...................... 39 1.3.1 Spall liners.............................. 39 1.3.2 Trauma attenuating backings................... 39 1.3.3 Laminate structures ........................ 40 1.4 The mechanical behaviour of solids ................... 41 1.4.1 Stress and Strain .......................... 41 1.4.2 Mechanical properties....................... 42 1.4.2.1 Young’s modulus .................... 43 1.4.2.2 Yield strength ...................... 43 1.4.2.3 Flow stress........................ 43 1.4.2.4 Ultimate strength .................... 44 1.4.3 Stress-strain curves......................... 44 1.4.4 Strain rate.............................. 45 1.5 Mechanical Testing Techniques...................... 47 1.6 Research description............................ 48 1.7 About this report.............................. 49 II Mechanical testing techniques 51 2 Split-Hopkinson pressure bar 53 2.1 The modern SHPB ............................. 56 2.1.1 SHPB theory ............................ 57 2.2 Constructing an SHPB........................... 59 2.2.1 Pressure bar configuration .................... 59 2.2.2 Bar material considerations.................... 61 2.2.2.1 Acoustic impedance. .................. 61 2.2.3 Projectile design .......................... 63 2.2.4 Pulse shaping............................ 63 2.2.5 Gas gun ............................... 64 2.2.6 Pressure bar support & alignment................. 66 2.3 Specimen design .............................. 66 2.3.1 Inertia effects in specimens.................... 68 2.3.2 Stress equilibrium in specimens ................. 69 2.3.3 Friction in specimens........................ 69 2.4 Supplementary equipment......................... 70 viii Contents 2.4.1 Strain gauges............................. 70 2.4.1.1 The potential divider................... 71 2.4.1.2 The Wheatstone bridge.................. 73 2.4.1.3 Power supply ...................... 73 2.4.1.4 Wiring considerations.................. 74 2.4.1.5 Oscilloscopes....................... 74 2.5 SHPB Operation............................... 74 2.5.1 Smoothing & Filtering data..................... 75 2.5.1.1 Pre-process smoothing.................. 76 2.5.1.1.1 In-line filters.................. 76 2.5.1.1.2 n-point rolling average............. 78 2.5.1.2 Post-process smoothing. ................ 79 2.5.1.2.1 Bézier smoothing................ 79 2.5.1.2.2 Polynomial curve fitting............ 80 2.5.1.3 Smoothing and filtering overview. .......... 81 2.5.1.3.1 Comparing pre-process smoothing techniques. 81 2.5.1.3.2 Comparing post-process smoothing tech- niques. ..................... 82 2.5.1.3.3 Choosing the best smoothing method. 82 2.5.2 Analysing data............................ 84 2.5.2.1 Normalising data..................... 84 2.5.2.2 Pulse extraction...................... 85 2.5.2.3 Producing stress-strain curves. ............ 85 2.5.3 Understanding stress-strain curves................ 86 2.5.3.1 Finding the yield stress. ................ 86 2.5.3.2 Estimating Young’s modulus.............. 87 2.5.3.3 Finding the strain rate.................. 88 2.5.4 Measuring energy absorption................... 89 2.6 Alternative SHPB configurations..................... 89 2.6.1 Tensile SHPB ............................ 89 2.6.2 Brazilian technique. ........................ 90 3 Optical Dropweight 93 3.1 Operational theory............................. 93 3.2 The hardware ................................ 95 3.2.1 The dropweight, optical path and lower anvil......... 95 3.2.2 Anti-vibration block........................ 95 3.2.3 Triggering system ......................... 96 3.2.4 Accelerometer............................ 97 3.2.5 High-speed photogaphy...................... 97 3.2.5.1 AWRE C4 camera.................... 98 3.2.5.2 Shimadzu HPV-1 .................... 99 3.2.5.3 Flash unit.........................100 3.3 Specimen design ..............................100 3.4 ODW analysis................................101
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