Dynamic response analysis of thermoplastic polyurethane

The proper modeling of the strain-rate dependence of rubber-like polymers is of high importance in energy-absorbing systems design. There are several possibilities for modeling the material dynamic response of such materials, but the field of applicability, drawbacks and critical aspects of each developed approach are not definitely assessed yet. The present chapter discusses these topics for Thermoplastic PolyUrethane (TPU), being TPU one of the most used shock-absorber materials. The qualification of the most promising approaches is numerically established by performing Finite Element Analysis (FEA) of tensile and compressive tests at different strain-rates. For the selected constitutive models, the corresponding constitutive parameters are experimentally determined and then implemented in FE models. The assessment of each material model is then carried out by comparing the predicted response with the experimental one.