MECHANICAL SCIENCE

(MEC-MES 121)
3. Stress and Strain
 Loading of Materials
Tensile loading
 This is when the material is subjected to
external forces which stretch it.

Compressive loading
 A material subject to forces which squeeze it.
 Loading of Materials
 There are a number of different ways in
which load can be applied to a member.
Typical loading types are:
a) Static or dead loads, i.e. non-fluctuating loads,
generally caused by gravity effects.
b) Live loads, as produced by, for example, lorries
crossing a bridge.
c) Impact or shock loads caused by sudden blows.
d) Fatigue, fluctuating or alternating loads, the
magnitude and sign of the load changing with
time.
Shear loading
 A material is subject to forces which cause it
to twist or one face slide relative to an
opposite face.
 Direct/Normal Stress
 For uniform load intensity in a member,
direct stress is defined as the ratio of load to
cross-sectional area normal to the load.
 The direct stress may be tensile (a pull)

or compressive (a push).
 Stress has the units of pascal (Pa)
 1 Pa = 1 N/
 Because the area over which the forces are
applied is more generally rather than , it is
useful to recognise that:
◦ 1 GPa =1 GN/ = 1 kN/
◦ 1 MPa = 1 MN/ = 1 N/

 The area used in calculations of the stress is

generally the original area that existed
before the application of the forces. The
stress is thus sometimes referred to as the
engineering stress.
 The term true stress is used for the force
divided by the actual area existing in the
stressed state.

 The strength of a material is measured by a

force or stress needed to fracture it.
 Example
s
1. A bar of material with a cross-sectional
area of 50 is subject to tensile forces of
100 N. What is the tensile stress?
Solution

Tensile stress =
2. A pipe has an outside diameter of 50 mm
and an inside diameter of 45 mm and is
acted on by a tensile force of 50 kN. What
is the stress acting on the pipe?

Solution
The cross-sectional area of the pipe
where D=external diameter
d=internal diameter
 Direct Strain
 When a material is subject to tensile or
compressive forces, it changes in length.
 Strainis defined as the change in length
(extension or compression) per unit of
original length

 Strain may be produced in two ways:

• By application of a load
• By a change in temperature, unaccompanied by
load or stress.
 Since strain is a ratio of two lengths it has no
units; note that both lengths must be in the
same units of length.
 Strain due to an extension is considered
positive, that associated with a compression
is negative.
 Strain is frequently expressed as a
percentage:
 Example
s
1. A strip of material has a length of 50 mm.
When it is subject to tensile forces it
increases in length by 0.020 mm. What is
the strain?

Solution
2. A tensile test piece has a gauge length of
50 mm. This increases by 0.030 mm when
subject to tensile forces. What is the strain?

Solution
 Tensile Testing of Materials
 During tensile test, the material is stretched.
 The most common type of specimen for
tensile test is ‘Dog bone’ specimen.

Narrow region allows stress

to be concentrated and
deformation controlled

Tensile test specimen with

a strain gauge attached
 The specimen is clamped on the
machine and the gradual
increasing tensile loads/forces
are applied to the specimen until
failure occurs.

 The loads and extension are

recorded throughout the loading
operation.
Load
Measured by load cell
Extension
Measured by extensometer or strain gauge

Extensometer Strain gauge

 Processing Data
 Machine outputs load (N) versus extension
(m)
 Convert to engineering stress (Pa) and strain
(%)
σ = ; ε=
 Stress – Strain Graphs for
Various Engineering Materials
 Mild Steel in Tension
 A typical result for a test on a mild (low
carbon) steel bar is show below;
 The material undergoes the following stages:

Elastic
 Stage
Original (OA)
shape is restored when load is removed
(i.e. Strain returns to zero).
 The material obeys Hooke’s law, which states that:
• The applied stress is directly proportional to the
strain.

 This gives the straight-line graph.

Where E is the constant of
proportionality, known as the
modulus of elasticity or
Young’s modulus
 The units of E are those of
stress ().
 E gives measure of how stiff
a material is.
1777 - 1829
 A stiff material has a high
modulus of elasticity.
For most engineering materials the
modulus of elasticity is the same in
tension as in compression.
Typical values are:
 Steels 200 to 210 GPa,
 Aluminium alloys 70 to 80 GPa,
 Copper alloys 100 to 160 GPa.
 Mg: E = 45 GPa
 Rubber: E = 1 MN/
 Polymers: E = 0.1–10 GPa
 Diamond: E = 1200 GPa
 Wood/natural fibres: E = 10–100 GPa
Limit of Proportionality (A)
 Beyond A the material no longer obeys
Hooke’s law i.e. the linear nature of the
graph ceases.
Elastic Limit (B)
 The stress at which a permanent extension
occurs is the elastic limit stress and the
metal is no longer elastic.
 In black mild steel, the limit of
proportionality and elastic limit are very
close together and often cannot be
distinguished.
Permanent set

 Beyond the point B (elastic limit) plastic

deformation occurs and strains/extensions are not
totally recoverable.

 There
will thus be some permanent deformation or
permanent set when load is removed
Yield Stress
 At C the material stretches without further increase
in load. C is termed the yield point and the
corresponding stress is the yield stress.
 After the points C, termed the upper yield point,
and D, the lower yield point, relatively rapid
increases in strain occur without correspondingly
high increases in load or stress.
 The graph thus becomes much more shallow and
covers a much greater portion of the strain axis than
does the elastic range of the material.
 The capacity of a material to allow these large
plastic deformations is a measure of the so-called
ductility of the material
i.e. the yield point is reached at a certain load
and the material continues to yield at a
slightly lower load.
 For certain materials, for example, high
carbon steels and non-ferrous metals, it is
not possible to detect any difference
between the upper and lower yield points
and in some cases no yield point exists at
all.
 In such cases a proof stress is used to
indicate the onset of plastic strain.
 Plastic
stage
 Beyond the yield point some increase in load is
required to take the strain to point E on the graph.
 Between D and E the material is said to be in the
elastic-plastic state, some of the section remaining
elastic and hence contributing to recovery of the
original dimensions if load is removed, the
remainder being plastic.
 The material is said to work harden or increase in
strength.
 The process of cold working, i.e. cold drawing or
rolling, represents a work hardening or
strengthening.
Waisting /Necking
E represents the maximum load which the
test-piece can carry.
 At this point the extension is no longer
uniform along the length of the specimen
but is localized at one portion.
 The test-piece begins to neck down or
waist, the area at the waist decreasing
rapidly.
 Local extension continues with a decrease
of load until fracture occurs at point F.
 maximum / Ultimate Tensile Stress
 The ultimate tensile stress (UTS) is defined
as:

This is also known as the tensile strength of the

material of the bar.

Breaking
Stress
 The nominal fracture or breaking stress is:
 True Fracture
Stress
 The true or actual fracture stress is:

 This is greater than either the nominal

fracture stress or the UTS in a metal which
necks down, due to the reduced area at
fracture.
Fracture
 The appearance of the fracture is shown
below.
 It is described as a cup-and cone fracture
and is typical of a ductile material such as
mild steel.
Failure: factor of safety
 The term 'failure' applied to a material or element
in a machine.
 It can mean fracture in tension as discussed, or it
can mean that the member has deformed past the
elastic limit, buckled or collapsed.
 Fracture can also be brought about by bending or
cyclic stresses as well as by direct compression.
 In practice, engineering parts are designed with a
margin of safety i.e. by assuming a working or
allowable stress which is a fraction of the UTS or
in some cases, the yield stress.
 A factor of safety based on the UTS is given
by:

 The kind of loading is important in arriving

at a factor of safety.
 The loading may be dynamic, static,
fluctuating, suddenly applied or due to
wind.
Ductility
 Itis a property of a material to be drawn out
into a fine wire and undergo considerable
plastic deformation before fracture.
 Ductility is measured in two ways:
 Example
s
1. A material has a yield stress of 200 MPa.
What tensile forces will be needed to
cause yielding with a bar of the material
with a cross-sectional area of 100 ?

Solution

Yield force = Yield stress area

=
=
2. Calculate the maximum tensile force a
steel bar of cross-section 20 mm X 10 mm
can withstand if the tensile strength of the
material is 400 MPa.
Solution
Tensile strength = maximum stress

Maximum force = Tensile strength area

=
=
3. For a material with a tensile modulus of
elasticity of 200 GPa, what strain will be
produced by a stress of 4 MPa? Assume
that the limit of proportionality is not
exceeded.
Solution

Modulus of Elasticity =
4. A tie bar has two holes a distance of 4.0 m
apart. By how much does this distance
increase when a tensile load of 20 kN is
applied to the tie bar? The tie bar is a
rectangular section 40 mm X 10 mm and
the material of which the bar is made has a
tensile modulus of 210 GPa. Assume that
the limit of proportionality is not
exceeded.
 Solution

Strain =

Modulus of Elasticity, E=
5. A machine is mounted on a rubber pad.
The pad has to carry a load of 6 kN and
has a maximum compression of 2 mm
under this load. The maximum stress that
is allowed for the rubber is 0.25 MPa.
What is the size of the pad that would be
appropriate for these maximum
conditions? The modulus of elasticity for
the rubber can be taken as being constant
at 5 MPa.
 Solution
Compressive stress =

Modulus of Elasticity, E=

Strain =
 Shear Stress
 Consider a block or portion of material subjected to
a set of equal and opposite forces F
F

F
 There is then a tendency for one layer of the
material to slide over another to produce the form of
failure shown below
 Shear stress is defined as follows:

 This shear stress will always be tangential to

the area on which it acts.
 Application of shear stress
 Cutting plate by guillotine

• The total force F is exerted by the blade and is

balanced by an equal and opposite force provided at
the edge of the table.
• The area resisting shear is measured by the plate
thickness multiplied by the length of the blade.
  Punching operation

• The area resisting shear would be the plate

thickness multiplied by the perimeter of the
hole punched.
  Riveted Joints
A structural member commonly loaded in shear
is a rivet.
Single-shear

The area resisting shear is the cross-sectional area of

the rivet , where d = rivet diameter

Double-shear

The area resisting shear is twice the cross-sectional

area of the rivet
 Example
A load F of 5 kN is applied to the tensile
member shown below and is carried at the joint
by a single rivet. The angle of the joint is to
the axis of the load. Calculate the tensile and
shear stresses in a 20 mm diameter rivet.
Solution
 Shear Strain
 It is the angle of deformation ( or )

It is measured in radians and hence is non-dimensional

i.e. it has no units.
SHEAR STRAIN
Shear strain is given by the
angle of deformation ADA’ or
BCB’ in radians:
rad
(since this angle is always
small)
 Modulus of Rigidity
 Formaterials within the elastic range the
shear strain is proportional to the shear stress
producing it,

 The constant G is termed the modulus of rigidity or

shear modulus.
 The units of G are those of stress, or
 Poisson’s Ratio
 When a piece of material is stretched, there
is a transverse contraction of the material.
 Poisson’s ratio is the ratio of the transverse
strain to the longitudinal strain.

 The minus sign is because when one strain is

tensile and giving an increase in length the
other is compressive and giving a reduction
in length.
 It has no units.
 For most engineering metals, Poisson's ratio
is about 0.3
 Example

A bar of mild steel of length 100 mm is

extended by 0.01 mm. By how much will the
width of the bar contract if initially the bar has
a width of l0 mm? Poisson's ratio = 0.31.
 Solution
Longitudinal Strain = =
= 0.0001

Poisson’s ratio =
Transverse strain = . 3 10.0001
= 0.000 031
Transverse strain =
Change in width = Transverse strain Original
width = 0.000 03 1 X 10
= 0.000 3 1 mm