Mechanical Properties of Thick Wall, Compression Molded PEEK at Elevated Temperatures

Abstract

The oil-and-gas industry uses PEEK (polyether ether ketone) because PEEK withstands high temperature and pressure. High temperature and pressure typically degrade and enhance—respectively—polymer mechanical properties from the room temperature values. It is important to build a test apparatus that measures PEEK’s mechanical properties under these conditions. This work is the first step in creating such an apparatus by testing thick-wall compression-molded PEEK at elevated temperatures. At room temperature, yield strength was within experimental error between compression molded PEEK samples and injection molded samples at 0.1 s^-1 strain rate. More work is needed to compare PEEK’s mechanical properties when using different process methods.