Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 February 2011
The contact stresses resulting from indentation of a compliant coating on a rigid substrate cause debond cracks to initiate and propagate along the interface. The indentation debonding behavior of four polymer coatings on glass substrates is investigated. A model is developed for calculating interfacial fracture energy based on data of indenter load vs. debond crack size. Based on the experimental observations and the data for the four coating systems, the limitations of the model are discussed.