Dynamic mechanical analysis of thermosetting polymer composite materials

Dynamic mechanical analysis is a technique particularly used in the field of rheology. It facilitates the detection of a wide range of materials for their phase transitions and relaxation processes. It is a solid-state rheological property of viscoelastic materials as a function of frequency and time. This technique is useful in analyzing polymeric products. It covers forced resonance analyzers, stress and strain control, axial and torsional deformation, and free resonance analyzers. In this technique, the elastic and viscous responses of a sample under an oscillating load are monitored against temperature, time, and frequency. This technique became well known by the impressive amount of information about the structure of polymers obtained with the torsion pendulum apparatus. The torsion pendulum dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) apparatus is a so-called resonant system, that is, measuring frequency is not constant but the modern DMA system nearly has a fixed frequency system operating at ranges of 0.01–100 Hz with a temperature range of −150°C to 300°C. Recently, DMA is broadly used as a different polymer material, and plastics started taking the place of other previously used materials.