The storage module describes the ability of the material to store energy and describes the stiffness of the material. The loss module describes the part of the applied mechanical energy which was transferred into heat within the sample. The DMA is the test method under all available thermo analytique methods that gives the highest resolution in order to find small changes in the material structures. In addition it is possible to retrieve good information about the stiffness and the damping behavior, or the energy absorbing properties of a material, as a function of temperature or as a function of frequency. Then the response coming from the material is measured.
All viscoelastic materials including polymers show a time and temperature dependency.
This can be easily shown through DMA tests. The DMA measures the temperature of the glasspoint were a material changes from a hard state into a soft and flexible condition. These measurements can be used to understand the changes in stiffness of a material as a function of temperature and time. The DMA measures the energy absorption or the damping characteristics of materials. It is also possible to study softening points below the glasspoint, that are in conjunction with user characteristics of material and even a ruff estimate of the life time of the product is possible.