Tensile creep and recovery in ultra-high modulus linear polyethylenes

The tensile creep and recovery of oriented linear polyethylene (LPE) monofilaments have been studied for a range of samples of different structure. Starting with a comparison of samples of different draw ratio prepared from one grade of polymer, the measurements were extended to examine the effects of molecular weight. Although the viscoelastic behaviour is markedly non-linear it was found valuable to model the creep and recovery at each level...