Advanced fragmentation stage of oxide coating on polymer substrate under biaxial tension

Crack patterns of 100-nm-thick silicon oxide coating on polypropylene film subjected to equibiaxial stress loading are studied experimentally. The loading is achieved by means of a bulging cell mounted under an optical microscope with stepwise pressurization of film specimens. The evolution of the coating fragment area distribution at relatively high strains is modeled using Weibull statistics to describe the coating strength. The fragment area distribution at an advanced fragmentation stage is shown to scale with the average fragment area, the latter being a power function of the applied biaxial strain. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.