A mandrel peel test is established for measuring the adhesive fracture toughness of a metal/rubber-toughened epoxy laminate system. By adopting an energy balance analysis it is possible to determine directly both adhesive fracture toughness and plastic work in bending the peel arm around the mandrel. The suitability of the procedure is examined for various types of metal peel arms, which are classified in terms of their ability to deform plastically during the test. The plastic work is also predicted theoretically, and comparisons are made between the measured and calculated values. The fracture energies determined from the mandrel tests are compared with those obtained from 90degrees fixed-arm peel tests. For the calculations of plastic work in bending in the fixed arm test, various options are used when modelling the tensile stress-strain behaviour of the peel arm material. In addition,the adhesive layer thickness is considered in terms of its influence on the calculation of adhesive fracture toughness.