Chapter 6: Mechanical properties of

Metals
ISSUES TO ADDRESS...
• Stress and strain: What are they and why are
they used instead of load and deformation?
• Elastic behaviour: When loads are small, how much
deformation occurs? What materials deform least?
• Plastic behaviour: At what point does permanent
deformation occur? What materials are most
resistant to permanent deformation?
• Toughness and ductility: What are they and how
do we measure them?
 Mechanical Properties of Metals

• The mechanical behaviour of a material

describes how a material deforms under an
applied load
• While the term ‘mechanical’ sounds like an
engineering term, mechanical properties are
important in many non-engineering disciplines
 Examples
• Tree

• Plane wings
• Hip joint
• Horse
• Car wheels
• Wind turbine
blade
 Examples
• Cell mechanics
• Mechanical forces play a
major role in the regulation
of cell adhesion and
cytoskeletal organization
• Cell mechanosensory
response to applied force

cardiac fibroblast
plated on a large
grid pattern
N Balaban et al Nature Cell Biology 3 (2001) 466
 Mechanical properties
• The mechanical behaviour of a material is derived from the
chemical bonding present
• An approximation of chemical bond acting as springs is useful
for determining the mechanical properties of materials
• Consider Copper and Diamond

How easy is it to separate two

Cu CuCu atoms in Copper and Carbon?

How much force do we need

C CC to apply to separate two
atoms in Copper and Carbon?
Something we know about bonding

Repulsive energy ER

Interatomic separation r

Net energy EN

Attractive energy EA
 Different bonds
Distance

Potential
energy
Cu Cu

Consider the increase in energy

required to increase the distance
between the atoms
Distance

Potential
energy
C C

The potential energy curve shows

that more energy is required to
separate a C-C bond than a Cu-Cu
bond
 Separating atoms

• The shape of the potential energy curve

describes the difficulty in separating different
atoms
• A ‘sharper’ potential well indicates more
difficulty in separating the two atoms
Distance

Potential
energy
Easy to separate

Difficult to separate
 Measuring mechanical properties

• Mechanical properties of materials could be

found by separating atoms from one another
but this is difficult (although note that not
impossible!) as the size of atoms are small
• Materials are large, so mechanical testing is
carried out on these!
• Mechanical testing involves separating the
atoms in the material by applying a force
 Mechanical testing

• We need to know two quantities in order to

decide if the atoms are easy to separate
– The force that is applied to separate the atoms in
the material
– The distance the atoms separate by, shown as the
amount the material deforms under the applied
force
• Mechanical testing equipment is used to apply
a displacement and record the force
 Mechanical testing equipment

extensometer specimen
Mechanical testing equipment
 What gets recorded during mechanical testing?

• If we consider extending a material, this is known as a tensile test

Block of material

Cu

Force / N
CuCu

Extension / m
 Mechanical testing

• If we apply force continually then there

will be a corresponding continual
displacement
• All materials will show a linear response

Force / N
to this applied force
• If the force is removed then material
returns to its original size
• This linear response indicates an elastic Extension / m
response of a material
 Mechanical testing

• While force and extension are recorded during

tensile testing, these values are not useful in
themselves
• A thin copper wire will need far less force to
extend than a thick copper sheet
• Values of force and extension need to be
normalized against the material geometry
 Stress and strain

• Force F needs to be normalized against cross-

sectional area A to give stress (σ)
Force
F
Area =
A
If 100 N of force is applied
to an area of 1x10-6 m2
then the stress is

 100/1x10-6=1x104 Nm-2

Units can be Nm-2 but are

normally stated as Pa
(1Pa=1 Nm-2)
• Extension ΔL needs to be normalized against
the original length L0 to give strain (ε)
Force

L
=
L0 L0
A wire of length 10cm is
extended by 2cm. The strain
ε=2cm/10cm=0.2
L
Strain is dimensionless but
sometimes written in terms of
% extension i.e. 0.2 is 20%
strain, 0.02 is 2% strain etc.
 Measurement of strain

•Strain gauges are small conductive grids

that are bonded to the surface of a test
coupon.
•The change resistance is directly related to
the strain on the specimen.
 Common States of Stress
• Simple tension: cable

F F
A o = cross sectional
area (when unloaded)
F
=  
Ao
Ski lift (photo courtesy
• Torsion (a form of shear): drive shaft P.M. Anderson)

M Fs Ao
Ac
Fs
t =
Ao
M
2R
Note: t = M/AcR here.
 OTHER COMMON STRESS STATES (1)
• Simple compression:

Ao

Canyon Bridge, Los Alamos, NM

(photo courtesy P.M. Anderson)

F Note: compressive
Balanced Rock, Arches = structure member
National Park
(photo courtesy P.M. Anderson)
Ao ( < 0 here).

20
 OTHER COMMON STRESS STATES (2)
• Bi-axial tension: • Hydrostatic compression:

Pressurized tank Fish under

 >0 water
q

z > 0  h< 0
21
 Stress-strain curves
• We know that an applied force will cause both
stress and strain in a material
• The mechanical properties are usually
examined by plotting the stress against strain
for the material
• Features on this stress-strain curve allow us to
understand the mechanical properties of a
material
• Consider a simple tensile test on a material
• An increase in material strain from an applied force will give a
corresponding stress
• The stress-strain curve may look like: • A linear relationship between
stress and strain is known as
 F
Hooke's Law. The gradient is
known as the Elastic Modulus E
such that
E
=E

Linear-
elastic F
simple
tension
test

• The elastic modulus E tells us how easy it is to pull apart the bonds in
the material (so E for a Cu-Cu bond is lower than for a C-C bond)
 Young’s Moduli: Comparison
Graphite
Metals Composites
Ceramics Polymers
Alloys /fibers
Semicond
1200
10 00 Diamond
800
600
Si carbide
400 Tungsten Al oxide Carbon fibers only
Molybdenum Si nitride
E(GPa) 200
Steel, Ni
Tantalum <111>
C FRE(|| fibers)*
Platinum Si crystal
Cu alloys <100> Aramid fibers only
10 0 Zinc, Ti
80 Silver, Gold
Glass -soda A FRE(|| fibers)* Based on data in Table B2,
Aluminum Glass fibers only
60
Magnesium,
Tin G FRE(|| fibers)* Callister 7e.
40
Concrete Composite data based on
109 Pa 20 GFRE* reinforced epoxy with 60 vol%
CFRE *
G FRE( fibers)*
of aligned
G raphite
10 carbon (CFRE),
8 C FRE( fibers) *
6 AFRE( fibers) *
aramid (AFRE), or
Polyester glass (GFRE)
4 PET
PS fibers.
PC Epoxy only
2
PP
1 HDP E
0.8
0.6 Wood( grain)
PTF E
0.4

0.2 LDPE
24
• This stress-strain curve indicates that the material is linear-
elastic
• Removing the force will cause the material to spring back to
its original shape
Note: as we tensile
 F
test the material, there
will be caused an axial
strain εA
and a transverse strain
εT .
W0 L0 The Poisson’s ratio (ν)
 describes this through:

F
simple
tension
test
T
n=- 
A
 Poisson's ratio, n
• Poisson's ratio, n: T

T
n=-
A A

metals: n ~ 0.33 -n
ceramics: n ~ 0.25
polymers: n ~ 0.40

n has dimensionless units n > 0.50 density increases X

n < 0.50 density decreases
(voids form)
 Plastic deformation
• All solids have an elastic regime
• At increasing strains, many materials show a deviation
from this linear elastic behaviour
• Plastic behaviour is when the stress increase falls with
increasing strain. A typical stress strain curve will be:
The elastic regime corresponds to
σ plastic the bonds being extended and
springing back to their original
equilibrium distance
Linear
Linear elastic The plastic regime corresponds to
elastic the bonds being permanently
ε deformed and do not springing
back to their original equilibrium
distance
Plastic deformation causes necking and an associated large
reduction in the cross-sectional area of the material with strain
 Plastic Deformation (Metals)
1. Initial 2. Small load 3. Unload
bonds
planes
stretch
still
& planes
sheared
shear

d plastic
d elastic + plastic

F F
Plastic means permanent!
linear linear
elastic elastic
d
dplastic
Identification of material properties from
stress-strain curves
• The mechanical characteristics of materials are
often selected for specific applications
• We already know about elastic modulus but
other properties need to be considered
• Materials that show plastic deformation up to
large strains are known as ductile materials
• Materials that show little of no plastic
deformation and break at small strains (<0.03)
are brittle materials
• The stress-strain curves for brittle and
ductile materials can be shown as:
Ductile materials can often fail in a
brittle process known as ‘necking’. This is
when significant plastic
deformation occurs locally
 ductile


EXAMPLE 1 – Bone is typically a ductile material. Plastic deformation
can often be repaired. At old age, bone can become brittle
EXAMPLE 2 – Tooth has a high elastic modulus but is brittle. Large
deformation is not desirable as gum damage may occur
EXAMPLE 3 – Skis need to be fairly ductile due to bending and impact
which often occurs
 Toughness
• Toughness is an important material parameter that decribes
the amount of energy absorbed before fracture
• If we consider a force versus displacement plot for a material
that is linear elastic and extended to failure:
The area defined by the curve is
equal to ½ force x extension.
If we consider the units, this
gives Nm or J
Force / N

Therefore, a tough material

requires a large energy (J) in
order to fracture

Extension / m
 Examples
small toughness (ceramics)

large toughness (metals)


very small toughness
(some polymers)


Brittle fracture: elastic energy
Ductile fracture: elastic + plastic energy
 Elastic Limits and Failure
• Stress-strain curves are also important for defining the
strength of a material
• Ultimate Strength (σf) is generally the maximum
amount of force per unit area that the material can
sustain.
• Note: strength is sometimes defined in terms of the
testing configuration i.e. tensile strength, compressive
strength
• Yield strength (σy) is the maximum force per unit area
that a material can sustain before plastic deformation
occurs
• Sometimes the stress just before the material fails is
lower than the ultimate strength and is typically called
the rupture point
 Example
brittle

Ultimate strength
Yield strength

= tensile strength

 ductile


 Hardness
• Resistance to permanently indenting the surface
• Large hardness means:
– resistance to plastic deformation or cracking in
compression
– better wear properties
• Critical in a number of material applications, e.g. teeth
need to be hard and dental restorations also need to
have a high hardness
• Hardness tests are generally easy to perform and do not
fail the whole sample
• Hardness is directly related to tensile strength i.e. a
material with a large tensile strength is also hard
 apply known force
Indenter: 10 mm Measure size of
sphere indent after removal
Smaller indents
(i.e. smaller d)
D Removal of force and d
indicates larger
indenter hardness
 Hardness scales
• The hardness of materials are typically
quantified according to an arbitrary scale
most brasses easy to machine cutting nitrided
plastics Al alloys steels file hard tools steels diamond

increasing hardness

• A larger hardness value indicates a resistance

of the material to permanent indentation
• The 4 common scales of hardness are
Rockwell (HR), Brinell (HB), Knoop (HK) and
Vickers (HV)
 Hardness: Measurement
Table 6.5
 A note on Rockwell indentation
• Rockwell indentation tests use set indentation
loads (weights) and a range from 0-130 to define
hardness
• The test first uses a minor load of 10 kg to indent
the sample
• A second major load is used to push the
indenter into the sample to a set depth
• The indentation depth of this major load relative
to the minor load defines the Rockwell Hardness
 Rockwell Hardness

• Example: If using a diamond indenter with a

100 kg load, the HR will be shown as a number
followed by HRD
• 80 HRD will be a harder material than 40 HRD
 Moh’s hardness
• An empirical
hardness range
describes the
Moh’s hardness
by a simple
number from 1-10
 True stress and strain
• We have previous discussed the mechanical
properties of materials in terms of (engineering)
stress and strain
• However, a material’s dimensions can change
during deformation in a mechanical test
• For example, during tensile testing, the cross-
sectional area (A0) of a material will decrease,
but the engineering stress is calculated using
the initial cross-sectional area
• The true stress in the material (σT) must therefore be related
to the cross-sectional area at a particular instance in time (Ai)
by:
T = F Ai

• The true strain εT has to be corrected based on the initial

length l0 and the sample length at a particular instance in time
li using:  = ln  
T ( i o )
 True stress and strain
• The true stress and strain are related to
engineering stress and strain by:
T = (1 +  )
T = ln(1 +  )

• While true stress and strain are most

accurate for characterising material
properties, engineering stress and strain
are the easiest to measure and are almost
always used in mechanical testing
 Summary
• Definition of stress and strain
• Elastic and plastic behaviour
• Mechanical characteristics of materials
(Elastic modulus, yield strength, UTS,
Poisson’s ratio)
• Toughness and how to calculate from
stress-strain curves
• Hardness