Experimental Determination of Elastic and Rupture Properties of Printed Ninjaflex

Abstract

In this paper, the effect of the 3D printing procedure on the elasticity during fused deposition modeling (FDM) is investigated. The considered material with brand name Ninjaflex is a thermoplastic polyurethane. Uniaxial tension tests are performed to identify the material properties, specifically the Young’s modulus, the maximum stretch, the tensile strength and the material’s fracture toughness. The influence of geometric characteristics on the material properties is studied. From the experimental results the parameters of Ogden’s hyperelastic material model are derived. A finite element simulation of the uniaxial tensile test validates the values obtained from a conditional least-square fit. In conclusion, additional to the experimentally determined rupture properties, the elastic parameters adapted to a Neo-Hookean, a Money-Rivlin and an Ogden material model of Ninjaflex are presented.