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Time-to-failure of polymers, and the actual failure mode, are influenced by stress, temperature, processing history, and molecular weight. We show that long-term ductile failure under constant load is governed by the same process as short term ductile failure at constant rate of deformation. Failure proves to originate from the polymer's intrinsic deformation behavior, more particularly the true strain softening after yield, which inherently leads to the initiation of localized deformation zones. In a previous study, we developed a constitutive model that includes physical aging and is capable of numerically predicting plastic instabilities. Using this model the ductile failure of polycarbonates with different thermal histories, subjected to constant loads, is accurately predicted also for different loading geometries. Even the endurance limit, observed for quenched materials, is predicted and it is shown that it originates from the structural evolution due to physical aging that occurs during loading. For low molecular weight materials this same process causes a ductile-to-brittle transition. A quantitative prediction thereof is, however, outside the scope of this paper and requires a more detailed study.

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