Tensile fatigue behaviour of PBO fibres
Résumé
Poly(p-phenylene benzobisoxazole) (PBO) fibres are finding increasing applications on account of their exceptional stiffness and strength. This article presents results from tests on single PBO filaments, to characterize their intrinsic behaviour under quasi-static and cyclic tensile loading. Scanning electron microscopy is used to show the fibrillation mechanism leading to failure. Results are compared to data for polyester, aramid and high modulus polyethylene fibres. PBO fibres show shorter fatigue lifetimes than the other fibres when maximum stress is expressed as a percentage of quasi-static break load, but the absolute stress values applied are much higher for an equivalent lifetime.