This article reviews the impact response of plastic components and the various methods used to evaluate it.. It describes the effects of loading rate on polymer deformation and the influence of temperature and strain rate on failure mode. It discusses the advantages and limitations of standard impact tests, the use of puncture tests for assessing material behavior under extreme strain, and the application of fracture mechanics for analyzing impact failures. It also develops and demonstrates the theory involved in the design and analysis of thin-walled, injection-molded plastic components.

Instrumented puncture tests according to ISO 6603-2 and ASTMD3763 were executed for five different Polypropylene compounds (talcum-, glass fibre- and elastomer modified) with specimen thicknesses ranging from 1mm to 4 mm. Over 1500 puncture tests were executed at the Impact & Long-term Behaviour laboratory of the company Borealisr in Linz. This serves as strong foundation for statistical evaluations of the ductile/brittle transition temperature. For different materials and ductile/brittle transition determination methods, similar trends have been observed, which were characterized by introducing shift factors.