Polymers are now an important class of engineering material, present in almost every manufactured product. They also have distinctive physical properties and manufacturing routes, in many respects quite different from those of other engineering materials such as metals. Hence the subject of engineering with polymers has become an essential ingredient of the skill set of many of today's professional engineers. This book is designed to help teaching and learning of the subject of Polymer Engineering. It is especially focussed on the relevant aspects of materials science, mechanical engineering and production engineering, at a level of expertise typical of advanced undergraduate or postgraduate students of engineering or materials science.
The authors' aim is to provide an educational tool, not only conveying information but also engaging the reader and developing their confidence and skills by applying, in the polymer engineering context, their wider knowledge of chemistry, materials, physics and mathematics. The book's coverage ranges from what polymers are and how they are structured, through their distinctive mechanical and thermal properties, to the product manufacturing processes available, and the principles of product design with them.
This is the third edition of a book that has been widely used in university education of engineers and materials scientists for 36 years. It includes many new features important to the polymer engineer of today. Examples are greater emphasis on environmental concerns and how these are addressed, inclusion of bio-sourced polymers and use of natural fibres as reinforcement, and the rapidly developing 'additive manufacturing' production routes.
N. G. McCrum, (deceased) Emeritus Fellow, Hertford College, Oxford, UK, C.P. Buckley, Emeritus Professor, University of Oxford, UK, C.B. Bucknall, (deceased) Emeritus Professor, Cranfield University, UK
N.G. McCrum studied Physics at Oxford University completing a doctorate in low temperature physics in 1954. He then taught Physics for two years at Pennsylvania State University in the USA, before moving to the DuPont Experimental Station in Wlimington, Delaware, where he was a Research Associate studying mechanical properties of polymers. In 1962 he moved back to the UK, to a one year research position in the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge, before being recruited in 1963 by Oxford University as a Senior Research Officer, and then in 1966 as a University Lecturer in Engineering Science and Tutorial Fellow of Hertford College, Oxford. Gerry became known internationally as a leading authority on the viscoelasticity of polymers. He retired in 1994, and died in 2013.
C.P. Buckley studied Engineering Science at Oxford University from 1965 to 1972, and then was a post-doctoral researcher in polymers, first at CRM in Strasbourg, France and then at Oxford University, before becoming Lecturer in Fibre Physics at UMIST, Manchester University in 1975. In 1980 he moved within UMIST to become Lecturer then Senior Lecturer in Polymer Engineering, and then in 1990 was appointed University Lecturer in Engineering Science at Oxford University and Tutorial Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford. He was later Reader and then Professor of Engineering Science at Oxford University, before retiring in 2012. His research has concerned many aspects of the mechanical properties of polymers, their relation to polymer structure and their engineering consequences.
C.B. Bucknall studied Natural Sciences at Cambridge University, and then after two years of National Service in REME, he joined BX Plastics as a researcher in 1960, where he began pioneering research on toughening mechanisms in plastics. In 1967 he moved to Cranfield College of Aeronautics (now Cranfield University) as Lecturer. He was subsequently promoted to Professor and became Head of the Advanced Materials Department at Cranfield. He was well-known internationally as an authority on the toughening of plastics, and his 1977 book,
Toughened Plastics (1977) remains an authoritative text. He was also in demand as a consultant to several major plastics-producing companies. Clive retired from Cranfield in 2001, but continued contributing to research publications, and died in 2024.
