Yielding of oriented poly(vinyl chloride)

Poly(vinyl chloride) sheet was oriented by hot drawing. The yield behavior of the oriented sheet was then investigated under uniaxial tension at room temperature as a function of the angle between the tensile axis and the molecular alignment direction. The onset of yield was localized in deformation bands. The variation of yield stress with direction and the direction in which the deformation bands formed were found to be satisfactorily accounted for in terms of a yield criterion based on that of von Mises, provided that a term representing internal compressive stress in the molecular alignment direction was included. The internal stress was found to increase from zero with increasing draw ratio of the prior hot drawing. It is pointed out that other workers have found polymers to obey the yield criterion of Coulomb rather than that of von Mises.