Determination of the minimum sample size for a reliable strength measurement of talc‐filled polypropylene fibers

Abstract

Accurate determination of mechanical properties plays an important role to comment on improvement in the mechanical properties of particle-filled PP fibers. However, the existing standards are not totally suitable for reliable strength determination of particle-filled PP fibers. In the framework of this study, microsized talc particle-filled PP fibers were produced with different talc ratio and tensile strength measurements were performed with various gage lengths. Statistical Akaike Information Criterion analysis shows that strength distribution of talc-filled PP fibers is best characterized by Weibull distribution function. It is reported that, the gage length has almost no influence of Weibull parameters of pure PP fibers while strong effects on Weibull parameters of talc-filled PP fibers. It is shown that if the tensile strength of talc-filled PP fibers is to be measured, at least 50 samples, which is more than value suggested by existing standard, should be used for a reliable determination of Weibull parameters. Therefore, the main aim of this study is to question the feasibility of minimum sample size suggested by the existing ASTM D3822 standard for reliable strength measurement of talc filled PP fibers.

Surface Response Analysis for the Optimization of Mechanical and Thermal Properties of Polypropylene Composite Drawn Fibers with Talc and Carbon Nanotubes

“…[ 31 ]. There are plenty of studies using CNTs as fillers for drawn polypropylene composite fibers [ 6 , 16 , 18 , 19 , 21 , 30 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 ], whereas there is a paucity of research studies for polypropylene composite drawn fibers using talc as a filler [ 38 , 39 ]. Values of tensile strength in the range 300–1000 MPa have been reported in PP-drawn fibers with carbon nanotubes, e.g., for PP-amine functionalized carbon nanotubes [ 6 ] or for non-functionalized carbon nanotubes [ 36 ].…”