Mechanical Behaviour of Materials and

Alloy Theory and Equilibrium Diagrams

Class notes
By Titus Mulembo
Department of Mechatronic Engineering, DEKUT
Overview
The mechanical properties of a material are those properties that
involve a reaction to an applied load.

Why is an understanding of the mechanical behaviour of

materials important?

• The mechanical properties of metals determine the range of

usefulness of a material and establish the service life that can be
expected.
• Mechanical properties are also used to help classify and identify
material.
• The most common properties considered are strength, ductility,
hardness, impact resistance, and fracture toughness.

Basic facts about Mechanincal properties of materials

• Most structural materials are anisotropic, which means that their
material properties vary with orientation.
• Mechanical properties are generally specific to product form such as
sheet, plate, extrusion, casting, forging, and etc.
• The mechanical properties of a material are not constants and often
Modes of failure in materials

Depending on the mechanical properties of a material, there are

several reasons/modes of failure. These include:-
• Plastic deformation: Permanent distortion that occurs when a
material is subjected to tensile, compressive, bending, or
torsion stresses that exceed its yield strength and cause it to
elongate, compress, buckle, bend, or twist.
Yield point

Elastic
deformatio
n region Plastic deformation
region

Fig 1: Stress strain curve for conventional materials

such as steel
• By yielding: Yield strength is the maximum stress that can
be applied before a material begins to change shape
permanently.
• This is an approximation of a material’s elastic limit.
• If stress is added to a material but does not reach the
yield point, the material will return to its original shape
• By after the stress
fracture: This isisremoved.
the separation or
fragmentation of a solid body into two or
more parts under the action of stresses.
Fracture can be ductile or brittle.

• Ductile fracture involves a lot of

plastic deformation and can be
detected beforehand.

• Brittle failure is the brisk propagation

Fig 2: Ductile and brittle
of cracks through a material which fracture
typically occurs so quickly that no
plastic deformation takes place before
Modes of failure in materials

• By fatigue (delayed fracture): Fatigue failure is the formation

and propagation of cracks due to a repetitive or cyclic load.
Most fatigue failures are caused by cyclic loads significantly
below the loads that would result in yielding of the material.

Fig 3: Fatigue failure

demonstration.

Comparison of loading and

unloading cycles from nitinol
samples machined using
micro-EDM with different
discharge energies

• By environmentally-assisted cracking (delayed fracture) e.g., by

bending a material back and forth under salty water.
• By corrosion and/or wear (surface damage)
Key mechanical properties of materials

Stress – When a force is applied on an elastic body, the body deforms

and the way a body deforms depends on the type of force applied.
• A compressive force makes the body shorter whereas a tensile
force makes the body longer. These are DIRECT FORCES.
• Shear forces are unaligned forces pushing one part of a body in
one specific direction, and another part of the body in the
opposite direction.
Stress is force per the
unit area on which it
acts.
Stress, σ

Fig 4: Compressive, tensile and

shear forces
Strain: This is the measure of the
deformation of an object under stress
and is defined as the fractional change of
the object’s length when the object
experiences tensile stress.
Strain, ε
Elongation is a percentage calculated
as
% ɛ = (ΔL/L) x 100.
Ultimate elongation is the elongation at
fracture point.
Example: A steel rod is 2.5 mm in
diameter and 2 mm long. A force of 12
N is applied to it and it streches 0.3 mm.
Assuming that the material is in the
elastic region, determine the stress and
strain in the steel rod.
Ans: σ = 2.44 Mpa and ε = 0.00015

Reading assignment: Distinguish Fig 5: Compressive and tensile

forces and their resulting
between engineering stress and stain vs elongations
true stress and strain.
Engineering vs true stress and
strain

Engineering stress – This is the

force divided by the original area
of the specimen before loading: σ
= F/Ao.

However, as a material is loaded,

the area decreases. Therefore, the
true stress is the value of stress
in the material considering the
actual area of the specimen.

Because the area decreases as a

Fig 6: True and Engineering Stress-
material is loaded, true stress is Strain Curves
higher than engineering stress.

The engineering stress-strain curve

drops after the ultimate strength is
Young‘s Modulus (Elastic Modulus): This is in essence the stiffness of
a material. In other words, it is how easily it is bended or stretched.
Young's Modulus, E = =

Yield stress: Unless directly given, the most common engineering

approximation for yield stress is the 0.2 percent offset rule. To apply
this rule, assume that yield strain is 0.2 percent, and multiply by
Young's Modulus for your material σ = 0.002 x E.
Yield Stress,

Proof stress: The proof stress of a material is defined as the amount

of stress it can endure until it undergoes a relatively small amount of
plastic deformation. Specifically, proof stress is the point at which the
material exhibits 0.2% of plastic deformation.

Ultimate tensile strength: Ultimate strength is the point that

separates the strain hardening region and the necking region (refer to
Fig. 1). It shows the maximum amount of stress a material can bear
before failure.
Ultimate tensile strength,
Fracture stress: Fracture strength, also known as breaking
strength, is the stress at which a specimen fails via fracture.
Fracture stress =
Toughness: It denotes how well a material can resist fracturing when
force is applied. It requires strength & ductility which allows a material
to deform before fracturing.
Modulus of Toughness: The modulus of toughness is the amount of
strain energy per unit volume that a material can absorb just before it
fractures. The modulus of toughness is calculated as the area under
the stress-strain curve up to the fracture point.
Modulus of toughness
can be approximated
as:-

Where: is yield stress,

is the ultimate tensile
stress and is the strain
at fracture.
Fig 7: Illustration of modulous of
toughness
Stress-Strain Curves for conventional materials – steel example

Characteristics

1. Recoverable
elongagtions usually
less that 1%
2. Performs poorly
under cyclic loading
(low fatigue
resistance)

Fig 8: Stress stain relationship for conventional

materials such as steel
Stress-Strain Curves for superelastic materials – nitinol
example

Characteristics

1. Recoverable
elongagtions of over
8% achievable
2. Performs well under
cyclic loading (high
fatigue resistance)

Fig 9: Stress stain relationship for

superelastic nitinol
Superelasticity (pseudoelasticity) is the ability of a material to
recover the original shape after undergoing large deformations induced
by mechanical loads.
• It is caused by a phase transformation between the austenitic and
martensitic phases of a crystal.
• It is exhibited in shape-memory alloys and allows for large stains of
over 8% to be recovered as is the case in nitinol (unlike 0.8% for
steel).
•• The superelastic
As shown nature
in Figure of nitinol shape memory alloys alows the
9, nitinol's
material to be behaviour
stress-strain applied in areas
also where a lot of cyclic loading is
involved
exhibits asuch assimilarity
close in makingtostents
that body implants.
of bone and tendon, as opposed
to steel which has a significantly
different stress-strain behaviour.
• This allows nitinol to be
successfully utilized in medical
applications thus leading to
more rapid healing times and
less trauma infliction to Fig 10: Typical stress - strain
relationship for nitinol, stainless steel,
surrounding tissues.
bone and tendon tissues
NB: Read on other mechanical tests:
Phase diagrams
 Introduction
Phase:
A region in a material that differs in structure and function from
other regions.

Phase diagrams:
• Represents phases present in metal at different conditions
(Temperature, pressure and composition).

• Indicates equilibrium solid solubility of one element in another.

• Indicates temperature range under which solidification occurs.

• Indicates temperature at which different phases start to melt.

Phase diagrams of pure substances
• Pure substance exist as solid, liquid and vapor.
• Phases are separated by phase boundaries.
• Example : Water, Pure Iron.
• Different phases coexist at triple point.

Fig. 1(a): Pure water phase diagram Fig. 1(b): Pure iron phase diagram
Cooling curves
• Used to determine phase transition temperature.
• Temperature and time data of cooling molten metal is recorded
and plotted.
• Thermal arrest : heat lost = heat supplied by solidifying metal
• Alloys solidify over a range of temperature (no thermal arrest)
• The liquidus temperature is the temperature above which a
material is completely liquid.
• The solidus temperature is the temperature which the alloy is
100% solid.
• The freezing range of the alloy is the temperature difference
between the liquidus and solidus where the two phases exists, ie.,
the liquid and solid.

Fig. 2(a): Pure metal cooling curve Fig. 2(b): Iron cooling curve
Lever rule
• The Lever rule gives the weight % of phases in any two phase
regions.
Wt fraction of solid phase
= Xs = w0 – w1
ws – w1

Wt fraction of liquid phase

= Xl = ws – w0
ws – w1
W0 is the weight percentage of the
alloy.
Ws is the weight percentage within
Fig. 7: Lever rule representation the solid phase
Wl is the weight percentage in the
liquid phase
Iron-Carbon Equilibrium Diagram
• Iron is an allotropic
material (the
existence of a
chemical element in
two or more forms).
• The temperature at
which the allotropic
changes take place in
iron is influenced by
alloying elements,
the most important of
which is carbon.
• Phases present:
• α-Ferrite:
• Austenite (γ-phase
of iron)
• δ-ferrite Fig. 8: Iron-Carbide Equilibrium
• Cementite (Fe3C) diagram
Iron-Carbon Equilibrium Diagram

Fig. 9: Iron-Carbide Equilibrium

diagram