Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering

Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Putra Malaysia

EMM3806 Mechanical Engineering Laboratory I

Semester 2 (2020/2021)
Lab Title : LAB 2 – BENDING TEST
Group No. : E-1
Name Matrics No.

MUHAMMAD AFIQ BIN JAMAL MOHAMED 206003

MUHAMMAD AZWAR BIN MOHAMMAD SHAM 206567

KHAIRUL NASHRAN BIN ANUAR 205951

MUHAMMAD IZZAT NAJMI BIN WAHAK 206870

ADAM MUHAMMAD BIN WIZMANIDZAL 205481

Date of laboratory/experiment: 9.4.2021

Submission date of report: 16.4.2021
Lecturer Name: Dr. Mohd Zuhri bin Mohamed Yusoff
NO. CONTENTS PAGE

1. INTRODUCTION 1

2. EXPERIMENTAL WORK/METHODOLOGY 2

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 3

4. CONCLUSION 6

5. REFERENCES 6

6. APPENDIX 6
INTRODUCTION

Bend means when a force is applied to something that is straight and change it particular shape.
Bending is the work noun of bend. Bending definition from engineering mechanic side is a
characteristic of a slender object after an external load is put onto the perpendicular part of the
longitudinal axis of the object. Certain object will undergo deformation after a load is applied
and this occur because of shear force and bending moment. The normal stress that made the
bent is called flexure stresses.

Bending test is created to check the strength and capabilities of an element to withstand stress
during handling and assembly in application and construction. Bending test is also used to
ensure substrate such as ceramic to has sufficient resilience to withstand a specified strain.
When metallic element is used in the test, the test can be used to record the ability of the metal
to undergoes plastic deformation. The bending test that is used in the lab is three-point bend
test which is used to measure the modulus and flexural strength of any element. This test is
commonly use because it is simply easier to prepare the specimen and test it. After completing
the test, the result will be in a graph and show flexural strength, flexural modulus and yield
point. The three-point bend also has its own disadvantage which is the results of the test is very
sensitive to the specimen, loading geometry and the strain rate.

1
EXPERIMENTAL WORK / METHODOLOGY

1. Materials & Equipment:

The purpose of this experiment is to determine the flexural strength and modulus of
elasticity of various materials using the three-point bending test method. In order to attain
dimensions and measurements to start the experiment, equipment such as the Vernier
calliper and in some cases the ruler is used. As for the experiment itself the test jig and
the instron test system is used. The test jig often works as a holding device for a piece of
machine work while the loading nose and two support spans are applied as a three-point
force. Besides that, the instron test system that is set up with a load cell of 10 kN is used
to evaluate the mechanical properties of materials and components. The instron test
system is crucial because it uses a motor encoder and a load cell to collect data from the
test which is mostly accurate. The bending test is usually conducted on metals, ceramic
and polymer. In this experiment, ceramic and polymer which are white, transparent and
red in colour have been used as the test specimens totalling it to 4 specimens.

2. Experiment Set-up:

Firstly, the width (b), thickness (d), and the length (L) of the 4 specimens been measured
and recorded in a table. Second, the length of the support span had been measured based
on ASTM D790 and inputted in the control panel. Third, the first specimen had been
placed and positioned so that the upper surface is to the side and centered in the loading
assembly on the test jig. Forth, by operating the machine, the loading nose is bought into
contact with the upper surface of the specimen until there was full contact between the
loading and supporting surfaces and the specimen. Fifth, the width, thickness and length
of the specimen had been inputted into the control panel based on the table. Sixth, after
setting the load recorder on the front panel controller to zero ensuring load applied to be
read, the Start button have been pressed in order to start the flexural test. Seventh,
observation of the bending of the specimen as the load is gradually applied had been
done. Lastly, after the specimen reach complete failure, the maximum load has been
recorded in a table for further calculations. After repeating the experimental procedure for
3 other specimens, the test is done.

2
RESULTS
Table 1 shows the measurements of the specimen.
Specimen Beam Length L Beam Width b Beam thickness d
(mm) (mm) (mm)
Red 6.279 1.245 0.325
White 6.415 1.269 0.325
Transparent 6.310 1.271 0.347
Ceramic 10.929 1.636 0.745
Table 1: The dimensions of the specimen.

Comparison between all specimens

14000
12000
10000
8000
6000
4000
2000
0
Flexural Stress at Flexural Strain εf Modulus of Elasticity Flexural strength σfm
Break σfB (MPa) (mm) EB (MPa) (MPa)
CERAMIC 36.968 0 13281 36.698
WHITE 2462.38 0 2719 53.475
TRANSPARENT 898.68 0.0175 883 35.78
RED 1171.37 0.0234 1206 42.107

Table 2 shows the results obtained from the test.

Load-Deflection and the stress strain curve for the tested specimen.

Ceramic: Sample 1

Graph 1: load-deflection of ceramic fragile

3
 White Material: Sample 2

Graph 2: load-deflection of white specimen

Transparent Material: Sample 3

Graph 3: load-deflection of transparent specimen

Red Material: Sample 4

Graph 4: load-deflection of red specimen

4
DISCUSSION
The experimental results can be produced by the 3-point bending machine after the
various samples were broken under three-point bending (elastic deformation, plastic
deformation, and break point). All of the data was plotted in terms of flexural load (N) versus
flexural extension(mm). The span length of all the specimens was the same. The result of the
Table 1 and Table 2 were calculated by using the formula of flexural strength, flexural strength,
flexural stress at break, flexural strain and modulus elasticity by using the formula given:
σfB = σfM
𝜎𝑓𝑚 = 3𝑌𝐿/2𝑏𝑑2
𝜀𝑓 = 6𝐷𝑑/𝐿 2
𝐸𝐵 = 𝐿 3𝑚/4𝑏𝑑3
From the graph 1, the ceramic fragile was elastic deformation from 0 to 447.57 N. From
447.7 decrease to 0 N and stop which shown the ceramic fragile was fractured due to brittleness.
Secondly, based on graph 2 from 0 to 80(N), the white specimen was elastic deformation, then
from 95.57 to 78(N), the white specimen was strain hardening as the load increased and break
at the point 0 N. From the graph 3, from 0 to 40(N) the transparent material was elastic
deformation. Then from 40 to 73(N), the transparent specimen was plastic deformation and
followed by strain hardening phase.From graph 4, from 0 to 25(N), the red specimen was elastic
deformation. Then from 25 to 76, the red specimen was plastic deformation and followed by
strain hardening.
From the result, it has been shown about ductility of each specimen. Specimens red and
transparent which seem like Perspex can be assumed to have the same material because they
showed a slightly similar result. While white specimen has high toughness and large strain
because it takes little time to be fractured. Specimens red and transparent can reach 5%
deflection in this test. Respectively these two specimens are also ductile and have the soft
properties of the materials. The specimen of ceramic is the most brittle material than other
specimens because it does not have the yield point or in a plastic region and break at a certain
load but ceramic is the hardest material than other tested specimens. From this information,
flexural stress at the break for ceramic should just follow the flexural stress formula. Flexural
strain for ceramic and white specimens are 0 values because deflection did not occur for those
specimens because it already breaks.
Instrumental systematics errors arise when an instrument's design is faulty, resulting in
erroneous readings. Second, when the observer misreads a measurement of the measured
specimen, which is to measure the depth and thickness of the specimens, the observational
systematic error occurs. In the last one, practical error that can occur is the unit of measurement
whereas the system is put on default when filling out the thickness and width values on the
Instron machine's control panel. In a laboratory test, for example, taking the average reading
for thickness and width, care should be taken to prevent errors.

5
CONCLUSION

The aim of this experiment is carried out to investigate the relationship between deflection
and applied load. Two type of specimen has been used in the experiment which is ceramic and
plastic with different thickness. Bending machine has been used in order to measure the
deflection of specimen. Based on the data and observation, the deflection of specimen is
increased as the more force is applied for both ceramic stick and plastic stick. From the graph,
it shows that applied force is directly proportional to the deflection. The average modulus of
elasticity (E) shows the elasticity of the object test.

REFERENCE:

1. Wick, J. (2020, July 14). Three-point flexural TEST. Retrieved April 14, 2021,
from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-point_flexural_test

2. A. Ragab, A., & Ahm Bayoumi, S. (2021). Engineering Solid Mechanics

Fundamentals and Applications (1st ed.). CRC PRESS.AS.

3. Bending Tests - an overview | ScienceDirect Topics. Sciencedirect.com. (2021).

Retrieved 25 January 2021, from
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/bending-tests.

APPENDIX :