Rate effects on adhesion energy between polyethylene films and different substrates

Adhesion properties of LLDPE “stretch” films have been investigated. Adhesion fracture energy has been measured by means of the fracture mechanics approach to peel testing. Rate/temperature dependence of the adhesion energy has been examined, and found to be related to the linear viscoelastic behaviour of the LLDPE materials. The presence of an “adhesive phase”, closely related to the viscoelastic β-relaxation, is proposed. A semi-quantitative model, first proposed by Gent and Petrich, has been successfully applied to the results and has been shown to account for the observed features of the adhesion energy vs. rate master curves.