THE UNIVERSITY OF HONG KONG

DEPARTMENT OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING

MECH 2419 Properties of Materials
Laboratory Report 1

Name: Leung Kwok Yin UID: 3035089471

Practical Session I:

A. Ball model of atom arrangements in crystals

1. Examine the prepared models and identify them (Figures 1 to 3).

Body-centered-cubic (BCC)

Face-centered-cubic (FCC)
 Hexagonal-closed-packed (HCP)

2. On tray B build up a face centered cubic crystal as in Figure 4.

In this FCC model, abc pattern can be shown.

3. Sketch the arrangement of atoms on each face drawing size and relative positions of
atoms to scale. (figure 5,6,7). Can you identify the face in figure 7?

(100) Plane

(111) Plane
 (110) Plane
The face in figure 7 is (110) Plane.

4. On tray B build up a hexagonal close packed crystal and examine the face (figure 8).

Side view of hexagonal-closed-packed structure

The side view shows the abab pattern.
 Show how FCC and HCP are different by building up a model starting as in figure 9.

The orange balls of the upper part represent abc pattern of the FCC structure.
The orange balls of the bottom part represent abab pattern of the HCP structure.

5. Close packed planes

a. Find and sketch the closest packed plane of atoms for BCC, FCC and HCP.

For BCC structure, the (110) plane is the closest packed plane.
For FCC structure, the (111) plane is the closest packed plane.

For HCP structure, the (0001) plane is the closest packed plane.

b. How many nonparallel closest packed planes are in each unit cell?
There are 4 non-parallel closest packed planes for BCC.
There are 6 non-parallel closest packed planes for FCC.
There are 1 non-parallel closest packed plane for HCP.
6. On trays A, B, C, D move atoms along the surface by pushing with a pencil as in figures 10
and 11.
Sketch each of the planes and indicate the easy directions on each plane over short
single steps and long distances. How many easy directions can be found on each plane?
Over which plane is atom movement most easy?

Tray A
For 100 plane of BCC, 2 easy directions can be found.

Tray B
For 111 plane of FCC, 3 easy directions can be found.
For 110 plane of BCC, 2 easy directions can be found

For 100 plane of FCC, 2 easy directions can be found.

For BCC, atom movement is the easiest over the (110) plane.
For FCC, atom movement is the easiest over the (111) plane.

Among the above four planes, atom movement if the easiest over the (111) plane of FCC
on tray B. It is because it has greatest number of easy directions, i.e. 3.
7. Construct a twin as shown in figures 12 to 15. Notice the fault in the stacking on all sides.

Left View, which shows the abcba pattern

Right View

Front View
Back View
C. Tensile testing of aluminium
Objective: To compare the tensile strength and ductility of aluminium after cold
working by rolling, with that of annealed aluminium. (Section 7.10-7.12)

% cold work reduction = ( ti – tf )x 100 /ti

Samples: 2 aluminium test pieces cold worked from an original thickness of 1.5mm, and
1 well-annealed sample.

A B C D
Width 12.5mm 12.6mm 12.5mm 12.46mm
Initial 1.5mm 1.5mm 1.5mm 1.5mm
Thinckness,
ti(mm)
Thickness, 0.28mm 0.84mm 1.2mm 1.5mm
tf(mm)
Hardness 20.3HV NA 29.3HV NA
% cold work 81.3% 44% 20% 0%

Sample A
Sample B

Sample C
 Sample D

5. Plot tensile strength, elongation and hardness against % cold work on same graph.

A B C
% of cold work 81.3% 44% 20%
Tensile Stress 177.7 110.2 84.94
(N/mm2)
Tensile strain 0.0221 0.0306 0.0928
Total Elongation 2.209 3.057 9.262
(mm)
Hardness (HV) 20.3 NA 29.3
 tensile stress
200
180
160
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
20.00% 44% 81%

tensile strain
0.1
0.09
0.08
0.07
0.06
0.05
0.04
0.03
0.02
0.01
0
20.00% 44% 81%

total elongnation
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
20.00% 44% 81%

total elongnation
 total elongnation
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
20.00% 44% 81%

total elongnation

hardness
35

30

25

20

15

10

0
20.00% 81%

From the above graphs, when % of cold work on the aluminium metal increases, the
tensile stress, total elongation and hardness increase. However, the tensile strength and
total elongation decrease.
Discussion
A. Ball model of atom arrangements in crystals
Body-centered cubic (BCC) structure, Face-centered cubic (FCC) structure and Hexagonal
close-packed (HCP) structure are the three most common crystal structures.

From the ball models, it is shown that different structures have different patterns of
layers. For FCC, it has 3 different layers with the pattern of abcabcabc… For HCP, it has 2
different layers with the pattern of ababab…

About the number of non-parallel closest packed planes, BCC, FCC and HCP have 6, 4 and
1 respectively.
For BCC, there are 2 easy directions at most. For FCC and HCP, there are 3 easy directions
at most.

Slip is characterized by the vector of slipping and the plane which slip takes place.
Slip System = <slip vetor> {slip plane}
Number of slip systems = number of independent direction of slip x number of
nonparallel closest packed plane
Number of slip systems in BCC = <111>slip direction x {110}slip plane = 2 x 6 = 12
Number of slip systems in FCC = <110>slip direction x {111}slip plane = 3 x 4 = 12
Number of slip systems in HCP = <1120>slip direction x {0001}slip plane = 3 x 1 =3

The number of slip system in BCC and FCC is greater than the number of slip systems in
HCP.
Thus, the chance of slipping is much higher in FCC and BCC and the deformation is easier.
Moreover, BCC and FCC are more ductile because deformation can be easily happened
along the various systems. It is more brittle for HCP as it has less slip system.

The ‘twin’ structure that is constructed in the question 7, is the FCC Twin Model. When
there is a high pressure, the ‘FCC-HCP transition’ will occur. Stacking fault is occurred at
layer c and an abcbacba pattern will be formed.

B. Tensile testing of aluminium

Cold Working can harden the material. The material will be more resistant to plastic
deformation and elongation. Different kinds of dislocations occur in cold working. The
number of dislocation lines increases then. It is more difficult for dislocation to happen
with cold working, because the dislocation has to force its way through other dislocation
for further deformation. Thus, the material is less likely to undergo further dislocation.
The material after cold working will be then harder.

From the above graphs, it can be easily shown that the tensile stress , total elongation
and hardness increase when the % of cold work increases. It shows that the metal will be
less ductile and higher tensile strength after cold working.

Conclusion
By constructing the ball models, the structure of BCC, FCC and HCP are shown. The
positive relationship of the percentage of cold work and hardness is shown in the
experimental.