How to Choose the Right

Material
1E10 Lecture
by
David Taylor
Mechanical Engineering Dept
Whats It About?
This lecture is about the mechanical
properties of materials
how to measure them and use them.
Its important for any material which is
going to be subjected to mechanical forces
in use.
These forces cause the material to deform
(i.e. change shape) and may cause it to
fail (i.e. break).
Mechanical Properties in Design
Designers need to know about mechanical
properties
to choose the right material for a given
component (e.g. a cars crankshaft) or
structure (e.g. a dam).
They need to make sure that there wont
be too much deflection under load, and
that the forces wont be high enough to
cause failure.

Examples of Failures
A 737 engine; one of the turbine blades broke away and
exited through the engine casing, nearly taking someones
head off!
Examples of Failures
X-ray showing an artificial
hip joint, made of metal,
which broke in two whilst
inside someones leg.

As an engineer, you dont
want to be famous for
designing a component that
failed.
Defining and Measuring
Mechanical Properties
There are lots of mechanical properties; in
this lecture we are just going to look at the
simplest (and most important) ones, which
we call the static properties.
These can be measured using very simple
tests, conducted on samples of the
material.
The most important test is the tensile
test
The Tensile Test
Take a sample of
material
Pull on the ends to
stretch it
Measure the force
needed
You can also apply
other types of loads,
such as compression
or torsion, but well
stick to tension here.
FORCE F
Stretch
to new
length L
Original
Length L
o
Some Practicalities
You can use any size and
shape of sample provided it has
parallel sides
so the cross section is the
same throughout.
The shape of the cross section
doesnt matter, it can be
rectangular (as here), square,
circular, etc. Its area is A.
Normally we make the ends of
the specimen bigger so its easy
to grip in the testing machine
Cross
Section of
Sample,
area A
The Stress/Strain Curve
We want to see how much the sample stretches
for a given applied force.
So we could plot the force, F, against the stretch
(L-L
o
).
But its better to normalise these quantities, so
that the overall size of the sample doesnt
matter.
We do this by calculating the STRESS, s, which
is F/A and the STRAIN, e, which is (L-L
o
)/L
o
.
Typical Results
The stress/strain curve has different shapes in different materials;
below are some examples.
As strain increases, stress can go up or down
X indicates the point at which the sample breaks
S
t
r
e
s
s

s

(
u
n
i
t
s

N
/
m
2

=

P
a
)

Strain e (no units)
X
X
X
X
The stress/strain curve in more
detail
First Stage: Elastic Deformation
S
t
r
e
s
s

s

Strain e
X
In this part of the
curve, the material
behaves like a
spring.
If you remove the
stress, the strain
goes back to zero.
Stress is (usually)
proportional to
strain.

Stiffness
The materials stiffness is the slope of
the stress/strain curve in the elastic region.
Called Youngs modulus (or the elastic
modulus), symbol E.
If the line is straight then E = stress/strain
at any point on the line.
Using Stiffness
You can use E to calculate the strain for a
given stress, and therefore work out how
much the structure will deflect under
load
e.g. how much a cars suspension will
move when six people get in.
Also used to find the stress in the material
for a given amount of deformation
if this stress is too high it may fail.
Using Stiffness
Also used to prevent buckling.
Buckling is what happens when you have a long,
thin, structure loaded in compression
like a straw or a drinks can when you push on
the ends.
It suddenly gives this is buckling.
The analysis of buckling is complex the
important thing is that the only material property
it depends on is E.
Elastic Energy
If you load up a material in its elastic region, to some
stress s
then the area under the line is a measure of the energy
you used to do it. This area is actually the energy per unit
volume of material in the sample

S
t
r
e
s
s

s

Strain e
X
This energy is
stored in the
material and will
be released if you
unload it.
This is very
useful in a
mangonel, for
example!
Non-Linear Elasticity,Hysteresis
In some materials
(e.g. some
polymers) the
stress/strain line is
curved in the elastic
region
and sometimes
the loading and
unloading lines are
different.
Loading
Unloading
Non-Linear Elasticity,Hysteresis
In that case E is
not constant
and some
energy is lost,
(given by the area
between the
lines). This is
called hysteresis.
Loading
Unloading
Plastic Deformation, Damage and
Failure
Above a certain stress, s
y
, the stress/strain line becomes
flatter and curved, and unloading gives you a permanent
deformation.

S
t
r
e
s
s

s

Strain e
X
s
y

A
B
e.g. if you load up from
O to point A and then
unload, you get back to
B, not O.
The distance OB is the
plastic strain left in the
material
O
Plastic Deformation, Damage and
Failure
Why does this happen?
It depends on the material.
In metals, plastic strain occurs because the atoms in the
material can flow over each other.
In other materials, such as concrete and wood, its due
to damage in the material; small cracks and splits which
weaken it.
The important thing is that we cant use the material at a
stress greater than s
y
, so for engineering purposes its
the maximum allowable stress.

Plastic Deformation, Damage and
Failure
Two other points from the stress/strain curve:
The maximum point in the curve is called the Ultimate
Tensile Strength (UTS). We used to use this as a
measure of the strength of a material but these days we
normally use s
y
.
The strain and stress at the failure point X (e
f
, s
f
) are also
useful to know. e
f
is called the ductility; it tells you how
much deformation the material can take without failing,
which is useful for manufacturing operations like forging
and wire-drawing.

Energy Again, Toughness
The area under the
whole stress/strain curve
is the energy (per unit
volume) needed to make
it fail.
But you get some
energy back in elastic
recoil (the black
triangle).
The remaining area is
the energy absorbed by
the material in failing.
This is one measure of
the toughness of the
material.
S
t
r
e
s
s

s

Strain e
X
O
More About Toughness
Toughness is a property which is difficult to
define.
One definition is the energy to failure (as
above)
but these days we normally use the so-called
fracture toughness which is a measure of how
easily the material cracks.
Youll learn more about toughness (and other
mechanical properties) in the materials course
next year.
Summary
Weve seen that the simple tensile test can
tell you a lot about how a material
performs under load
how much it deforms, both temporarily
(elasticity) and permanently (plasticity)
how much energy it can store and
release
and how much stress and energy are
needed to break it.
Whats the stress?
This material information is useful only if you know what
stress (or strain) is going to arise in the component or
structure that youre designing.
In the tensile test the stress is simply found by F/A, but
thats not the case for a real structure, where the stress
will depend on the shape and forces it sees, and will vary
from place to place in the structure.
Stresses can be calculated for any structure; these days
we mostly use computer models (such as finite element
analysis) but you can use analytical equations for simple
structures like beams and arches, and to get a rough
estimate in more complex cases.
You will learn more about stress analysis in other
lectures and other courses.
More Information
If you want to learn more, try
Textbooks by Ashby & Jones: Engineering
Materials books 1 and 2. We use these books in
courses in 2
nd
and 3
rd
year.
Materials by Ashby, Shercliff and Cebon
Lots of information on line, in Wikipedia,
company databases, etc