ABSTRACT
This chapter illustrates various effects of time, temperature, and fluids on long-term service durability of a range of elastomers, mainly by employing various data obtained by Materials Engineering Research Laboratories. The established durability of elastomers in tire manufacture—the main industry of elastomer usage in volume terms—is the result of the tire industry continually researching many aspects of fatigue, abrasive wear, rubber-to-rubber adhesion and rubber-to-cord adhesion. Elastomers of many shapes and sizes must resist extremes of fluid type, temperature, and pressure in harsh environments and locations where replacement is essentially impossible. The successful service of elastomeric components depends on different overriding factors concerning deformation mode and environment. Most mechanical and civil engineering applications involving elastomers use the elastomer in compression and/or shear. Thermodynamic Gibbs free-energy considerations influence the degree of fluid absorption by the elastomer; associated enthalpic effects arise from the chemical nature of the elastomer, and entropic effects from the elastomer’s morphological structure and size of fluid molecules.
