Fracture mechanical analysis of two commercial polyoxymethylene homopolymer resins

This research addresses the fracture mechanical analysis of two commercially available polyoxymethylene homopolymer resins. Two types of experiments are used: monotonic fracture toughness tests and cyclic fatigue crack growth tests. The resulting total lifetimes in the fatigue crack growth tests are split up into the appropriate parts of crack growth initiation and fatigue crack propagation. Fracture surfaces of monotonic and cyclic tests are analyzed using light microscopy and scanning electron microscopy. Besides the mechanical tests, the morphology within the used compact tension specimens is examined in detail by using differential scanning calorimetry, small‐ and wide‐angle X‐ray scattering, and polarized light microscopy. The results are analyzed and discussed, considering observations in the previous studies published in the literature. It is shown that both materials can be well analyzed using linear elastic fracture mechanics and their fracture mechanical properties are presented in conjunction with a detailed documentation of the microstructure. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2014 , 131, 40831.