Lab 1 Report

Amr youssry
19-9057 T-28
Brinell hardness test:
The Brinell hardness test method consists of indenting the test material with a 10 mm
diameter hardened steel or carbide ball subjected to a load of 3000 kg. For softer materials
the load can be reduced to 1500 kg or 500 kg to avoid excessive indentation. The full load is
normally applied for 10 to 15 seconds in the case of iron and steel and for at least 30
seconds in the case of other metals. The diameter of the indentation left in the test material
is measured with a low powered microscope. The Brinell harness number is calculated by
dividing the load applied by the surface area of the indentation.

The diameter of the impression is the average of two readings at right angles and the use of
a Brinell hardness number table can simplify the determination of the Brinell hardness. A
well structured Brinell hardness number reveals the test conditions, and looks like this, "75
HB 10/500/30" which means that a Brinell Hardness of 75 was obtained using a 10mm
diameter hardened steel with a 500 kilogram load applied for a period of 30 seconds. On
tests of extremely hard metals a tungsten carbide ball is substituted for the steel ball.
Compared to the other hardness test methods, the Brinell ball makes the deepest and
widest indentation, so the test averages the hardness over a wider amount of material,
which will more accurately account for multiple grain structures and any irregularities in the
uniformity of the material. This method is the best for achieving the bulk or macro-hardness
of a material, particularly those materials with heterogeneous structures.

Rockwell test:

Stanley P. Rockwell invented the Rockwell hardness test. He was a metallurgist for a
large ball bearing company and he wanted a fast non-destructive way to determine if
the heat treatment process they were doing on the bearing races was successful. The
only hardness tests he had available at time were Vickers, Brinell and Scleroscope.
The Vickers test was too time consuming, Brinell indents were too big for his parts
and the Scleroscope was difficult to use, especially on his small parts.

To satisfy his needs he invented the Rockwell test method. This simple sequence of
test force application proved to be a major advance in the world of hardness testing. It
enabled the user to perform an accurate hardness test on a variety of sized parts in just
a few seconds.

Rockwell test methods are defined in the following standards:

 ASTM E18 Metals

 ISO 6508 Metals
 ASTM D785 Plastics

Knoop hardness test:

The Knoop hardness test (English pronunciation: /kǝˈnuːp/) is a microhardness test - a

test for mechanical hardness used particularly for very brittle materials or thin sheets,
where only a small indentation may be made for testing purposes. A pyramidal
diamond point is pressed into the polished surface of the test material with a known
force, for a specified dwell time, and the resulting indentation is measured using a
microscope. The geometry of this indenter is an extended pyramid with the length to
width ratio being 7:1 and respective face angles are 172 degrees for the long edge and
130 degrees for the short edge. The depth of the indentation can be approximated as
1/30 of the long dimension. The Knoop hardness HK or KHN is then given by the
formula:

where:

L = length of indentation along its long axis

Cp = correction factor related to the shape of the indenter, ideally 0.070279

P = load

HK values are typically in the range from 100 to 1000, when specified in the
conventional units of gf·mm−2. The SI unit, pascals, are sometimes used instead:
1 kgf·mm−2 = 9.80665 MPa.

The test was developed by Frederick Knoop and colleagues at the National Bureau of
Standards (now NIST) of the USA in 1939, and is defined by the ASTM D1474
standard.

The advantages of the test are that only a very small sample of material is required,
and that it is valid for a wide range of test forces. The main disadvantages are the
difficulty of using a microscope to measure the indentation (with an accuracy of 0.5
micrometre), and the time needed to prepare the sample and apply the indenter.

Vickers hardness test:

The Vickers hardness test was developed in 1924 by Smith and Sandland at Vickers
Ltd as an alternative to the Brinell method to measure the hardness of materials.[1] The
Vickers test is often easier to use than other hardness tests since the required
calculations are independent of the size of the indenter, and the indenter can be used
for all materials irrespective of hardness. The basic principle, as with all common
measures of hardness, is to observe the questioned material's ability to resist plastic
deformation from a standard source. The Vickers test can be used for all metals and
has one of the widest scales among hardness tests. The unit of hardness given by the
test is known as the Vickers Pyramid Number (HV) or Diamond Pyramid
Hardness (DPH). The hardness number can be converted into units of pascals, but
should not be confused with a pressure, which also has units of pascals. The hardness
number is determined by the load over the surface area of the indentation and not the
area normal to the force, and is therefore not a pressure.
The hardness number is not really a true property of the material and is an empirical
value that should be seen in conjunction with the experimental methods and hardness
scale used. When doing the hardness tests the distance between indentations must be
more than 2.5 indentation diameters apart to avoid interaction between the work-
hardened regions.

If HV is expressed in SI units the yield strength of the material can be approximated

as:

where c is a constant determined by geometrical factors usually ranging between 2

and 4.

The experiment :
The experiment in lab was done using the Vickers hardness test via 30 Kg of load in
diamond shape stress and 2 scales were applied:
A: number of complete horizontal lines.
B: reading of the middle vertical line.

1st Test:
A = 6, B = 23.5, A*0.05 + B*0.001 = 0.3235 HV average = 532.25
2nd Test:
A = 7, B = 33.5, A*0.05 + B*0.001 = 0.3835 HV average = 378.4
3rd Test:
A = 6, B = 33.5, A*0.01 + B*0.001 = 0.3335 HV average = 500.3