In many engineering applicatiosn polymers are exposed to loads imposed by an elastically deformed metallic constituent. Such "spring-like" loading induces material's response that is neither creep nor relaxation, and has no general "close-form" analytical solution. The goal of this paper is to investigate the possibility of predicting such time-dependent response, using linear viscoelastic material functions. Developed numerical solution was used for predicting the response of PMMA specimens exposed to spring loading in torsion. Comparison of the numerical predictions with the experimental results showed good agreement between the two, indicating that linear theory of viscoelasticity can be used for stress-strain prediction of this type of loading. Furthermore, spring loading experiments could be also used as a new experimental technique for simultaneous characterization of creep and relaxation material functions.
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