Constitutive modeling of the anisotropic behavior of Mullins softened filled rubbers

Original constitutive modeling is proposed for filled rubber materials in order to capture the anisotropic softened behavior induced by general non-proportional pre-loading histories. The hyperelastic framework is grounded on a thorough analysis of cyclic experimental data. The strain energy density is based on a directional approach. The model leans on the strain amplification factor concept applied over material directions according to the Mullins softening evolution. In order to provide a model versatile that applies for a wide range of materials, the proposed framework does not require to postulate the mathematical forms of the elementary directional strain energy density and of the Mullins softening evolution rule. A computational procedure is defined to build both functions incrementally from experimental data obtained during cyclic uniaxial tensile tests. Successful comparisons between the model and the experiments demonstrate the model abilities. Moreover, the model is shown to accurately predict the non-proportional uniaxial stress-stretch responses for uniaxially and biaxially pre-stretched samples. Finally, the model is efficiently tested on several materials and proves to provide a quantitative estimate of the anisotropy induced by the Mullins softening for a wide range of filled rubbers. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All right's reserved.