Identification of Ferrous and Non-Ferrous Metals

CF1100: Materials & Processes

Laboratory # 1
Objective:

To identify different types of metals you need to go by more than visual observations usually, such as
the case with copper, brass, and bronze three of these metals are all yellowish orange and look very
similar. This lab will help us identify different types of metals through various tests such as, a scratch
test, magnetic test, file test, and spark test.

Equipment:

 9 unknown metal cylinder samples all with a different stamp ranging from E-0 to E-8.
(Aluminum, Brass, Bronze, Copper, Cold rolled mild steel, hot rolled mild steel, IH Chrome,
Stainless Steel, and Zinc)
 A balance scale
 Horseshoe magnet
 A file
 Bench Grinder
 Digital Vernier Calliper
 Safety Glasses

(Digital Vernier Calliper) (Bench Grinder)

Procedure:

1. We went over what was expected of us for this lab with the instructor.
2. We were given the nine unknown metal samples.
3. Made visual observations of the unknowns, next we made a guess of what each metal actually
was (Aluminum, Brass, Bronze, Copper, Cold rolled mild steel, hot rolled mild steel, IH Chrome,
Stainless Steel, and Zinc).
4. We weighed each individual samples on a balance scale.
5. We measured the diameter and then length of each unknown metal cylinder using a digital
vernier calliper
6. From obtaining the diameter we can get the radius, and knowing the length we calculate the
density of each sample.
7. Next, using a file we tried to scratch each sample and tried to arrange them in order by hardness
(soft-very hard).
8. We next tried to scratch each sample off of each other also providing which sample is harder (a
hard unknown will scratch a softer one).
9. Using a magnet we can see whether or not an unknown is magnetic.
10. Using a pair of pliers and wearing a pair of safety glasses we used a grinder to do a spark test
(See appendix A), noting the length, colour, density, and if forking is present.

Theory:

 Digital Vernier Calliper- is a device used to measure the distance between two symmetrically
opposing sides.
 Density- is defined as its mass per unit volume. The symbol of density is ρ (the Greek letter rho).
ρ =m/V
 Volume of a cylinder- (πr2) x h
Results:

Guesses

Weight of Samples (kg)

E-0 0.2038
E-1 0.2012
E-2 0.2285
E-3 0.2043 Diameter, Length, and Density of Samples
E-4 0.2504
E-5 Diameter
0.1777 (m) Length(m) Density(kg/m3)
E-0
E-6 0.025
0.0714 0.050 8304.81
E-1
E-7 0.025
0.2159 0.050 8198.86
E-2
E-8 0.025
0.1718 0.050 9311.33
E-3 0.025 0.050 8325.18
E-4 0.026 0.050 9431.26
E-5 0.024 0.050 7862.83
E-6 0.025 0.050 2909.54
E-7 0.025 0.050 8797.88
E-8 0.024 0.049 7738.74

Magnetic Test

E-0 Yes
E-1 Yes
E-2 No
E-3 No
E-4 No
E-5 No
E-6 No
E-7 No
E-8 Yes

File Test (Softest to Hardest)

E-6
E-5
E-0
E-2
E-1
E-4
E-7
E-3
E-8

Scratch Test

Scratching Being Scratched

E-0 E-1 E-2 E-3 E-4 E-5 E-6-x E-7 E-8-x
E-0 -------- No Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes No
E-1 Yes -------- Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No
E-2 No No -------- No No Yes Yes No No
E-3 No No Yes -------- Yes Yes Yes Yes No
E-4 Yes No Yes No -------- Yes Yes Yes No
E-5 No No No No No -------- Yes No No
E-6 No No No No No No --------- No No
E-7 No No Yes No No Yes Yes -------- No
E-8 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ---------

Spark Test

E-0  A lot of forking

 Orange colour
 Short
 Low Density
E-1  A lot of forking
  Brassy orange colour
 Pretty long
 Medium Density
E-2  No sparks
 Minimal sparks from wheel of grinder
E-3  No forking
 Orange color
 Short
 Not dense
E-4  No sparks
E-5  No sparks
E-6  No sparks
E-7  No sparks
E-8  Fair bit of forking
 Yellow colour
 Medium length
 Dense

Identified Unknowns

E-0 Cold Rolled Mild Steel

E-1 Hot Rolled Mild Steel
E-2 Copper
E-3 Stainless Steel
E-4 Bronze
E-5 Zinc
E-6 Aluminum
E-7 Brass
E-8 IH Chrome

Analysis of Results:

We found that unknown E-0 was actually Cold-rolled steel because it had a lot of forking in the spark
test and they were short and were low density, while E-1’s sparks were long and medium density. We
also proved that E-1 scratched E-0, this also proves that E-0 was cold rolled steel and E-1 is hot rolled
steel. We found E-2 to be Copper because it is not magnetic, did not spark on the grinder, and was the
softest of the other orange coloured metals. E-3 was stainless steel because while a ferrous metal it was
not magnetic however it did spark proving it had to be stainless steel. E-4 was Bronze, this is so because
of its colour, did is not a ferrous metal so it did not spark, and was the hardest of the three orange
coloured unknowns. Zinc was E-5, we found this because its colour, softness, did not spark, and
everything except E-6 could scratch it. E-6 was Aluminum, you could tell this by its density, even just by
picking it up it was much lighter than the other unknowns, also Aluminum is a soft metal and all the
other unknowns were able to scratch it. We found E-7 to be Brass, not only because of its colour but
also from its density. Lastly we found E-8 to be IH chrome because this type of metal is very hard and
from the scratch tests we seen that nothing could scratch it, proving it to be IH chrome.

Some sources of error in this lab could be scratches to the metal samples or the pieces missing from the
samples, this could cause the densities of the metals to be off because they were not accounted for
when calculating. Also when preforming the scratch tests you would need to apply the same amount of
pressure to the samples every time you scratched them off of each other, this could cause the results of
this test to vary if the same pressure was not used at all times. Human error when measuring the
samples length and masses could cause the densities to be off as well. When using the grinder if you did
not apply the same amount of pressure each time to the different samples could cause the results not to
be as accurate. In this lab we could have tried to account for some of our sources of error but making
sure each and every time we were using the same amount of pressure while preforming the spark tests,
file tests, and scratch tests.

Conclusion:

Our unknowns were E-0 was cold rolled mild steel, E-1 was hot rolled mild steel, E-2 was copper, E-3 was
stainless steel, E-4 was bronze, E-5 was zinc, E-6 was aluminum, E-7 was brass, and E-8 was IH chrome.
In this lab we learned that you cannot just judge metals on visual appearances as we first did in this lab
because we only guesses five of the nine correctly. As IH chrome has the same visual characteristics of
stainless steel you would need to perform a scratch test to tell the difference. Also to tell the difference
between brass, bronze, and copper you would need to perform such tests as they all look very similar.