Mechanics of Material Lab

Experiment No.4

IMPACT TESTING

LAB REPORT

Submitted to: SIR AHMAD HAFEEZ

Dated: 16/03/2018

Batch: 15

Section: A

Group no.: A(II) 2

Submitted by:

Name of students Registration No.

M HAMZA SHAHZAD 160101046
M BASIM 160101072
M HUSSAIN 160101075
SAAD AZFAR 160101059
ABDULLAH FATIK 160101070
MUHAMMAD TALHA 160101044
ASIM MEHMOOD 160101109
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Table of Contents

1. INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................. 1
2. OBJECTIVE ....................................................................................................................... 2
3. THEORY ............................................................................................................................ 2
4. APPARATUS ..................................................................................................................... 4
5. EXPERIMENTATION ...................................................................................................... 5
5.1. PROCEDURE ............................................................................................................. 5
5.2. OBSERVATIONS AND CALCULATIONS ............................................................. 6
6. RESULTS ........................................................................................................................... 7
7. DISCUSSION ..................................................................................................................... 7
8. CONCLUSIONS ................................................................................................................ 7
9. REFERENCES ................................................................................................................... 7
1. INTRODUCTION
In this experiment an impact blow is delivered to a test specimen by means of
a pendulum-type hammer. The impact value of the material is determined
from the energy required to break the specimen. The experiment is performed
on mild steel. The pendulum strikes the specimen on the v-shaped notch in
the structure of the material. The material having Low strength (carbon steel)
are broken by the strike whereas the material which has high strength (mild
steel) faces some damage but is not completely fractured by the impact. There
are usually two techniques by which this experiment can be performed which
are called Charpy or Izod. In Charpy test a test specimen having a V-shaped
notch is placed on the holder in such position that the notched section is in the
center of the holder, and the specimen is broken by striking the back of the
notched section with the hammer. The fracture energy is determined from the
swing-up angle of the hammer and its swing-down angle. The Charpy impact
value is calculated by dividing the fracture energy by the cross-section area of
the specimen. It is usually done on metals. In Izod tests a test specimen
having a V-shaped notch is fixed vertically, and the specimen is broken by
striking it from the same side as that of the notch by the use of the hammer.
The fracture energy is determined from the swing-up angle of the hammer
and its swing-down angle. The Izod impact value (J/m, kJ/m2) is calculated
by dividing the fracture energy by the width of the specimen. The results can
be used to obtain the load bearing capacity of a material against momentary
stress from impact strength and fracture energy. The higher the impact value
of the material is the higher is the toughness of a material.

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2. OBJECTIVE
To study the principle of impact testing using metals which are susceptible to brittle
fracture such as mild steels.

3. THEORY
Impact test is a test used in studying the toughness of material. The toughness
is defined as the capacity of material to absorb energy and deform plastically
before fracturing. Toughness is associated with both ductility and strength of
materials.

Since the amount of plastic deformation that occurs before fracture is a measure
of the ductility of the material and because the stress needed to cause fracture
is a measure of its strength, it follows that toughness is associated with both the
ductility and strength of the material.

Some materials like cast iron, glass and some plastics which offer considerable
resistance to static load, often shatter easily when a sudden load (impact) is
applied. The impact strength is defined as the resistance of the materials to
shock. The impact testing is to find out the energy absorbed by a specimen
when brought to fracture by hammer blow and gives a quality of the material,
particularly its brittleness. Highly brittle materials have low impact strength.
Heat treatment of metals has found to lower impact considerably. They are
under the stress strain curve in a static tensile test is measure of the energy
absorbed per unit volume of the material, called the modules of toughness. This
is also a measure of the impact strength of the material. The impact load can be
applied in many ways. Allowing a standard mass to fall on the specimen from
progressively increasing heights until fracture occurs tests rails and framed
structural members. For laboratory Charpy impact tests is used. These notched
specimens are fractured with a standard blow from a pendulum hammer and
energy absorbed is measured.

Impact test involves the sudden and dynamic application of the load. For this
purpose, in general, a pendulum is made to swing from a fixed height and strike
the standard impact specimen. There are two types of method to test impact test
which is Izod test and Charpy test. These two methods are different in placing
the specimens. In Charpy test, the specimen is placed horizontally with notched
area facing away from the pendulum. Moreover, Charpy impact specimen has
both U-notch and V-notch specimen. Charpy test result can indicate how brittle
the materials are.

Charpy test is named after its inventors and was developed in the early 1900’s
before fracture mechanics theory was available. Impact properties are not
directly used in fracture mechanics calculations, but the economic impact tests

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continue to be used as a quality control method to assess notch sensitivity and
for comparing the relative toughness of engineering materials.

Figure 1: Schematics Diagram of Impact Testing

A typical curve in figure 2 shows different transition temperature on steel by

different definition.

Figure 2: Typical curve showing different transition temperature on steel

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4. APPARATUS

• Impact testing machine

• Charpy test specimens of mild steel
• Vernier caliper

Figure 3: Impact Testing Machine

The Pendulum is mounted on antifriction bearings. It has two starting positions, the
upper one for Charpy and the lower one for Izod testing. On release, the pendulum
swings down to brake the specimen and the energy absorbed in doing so is measured
as the difference between the height of drop before rupture of the test specimen and is
read from the maximum pointer position on the dial scale.
The Charpy test piece rests on alloy steel support anvils, fitted on the base of the
machine rigidly held in position by Allen screws. End stopper is provided for quickly
and accurately locating the test piece centrally between the supports.

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5. EXPERIMENTATION

5.1. PROCEDURE

• First measure all the dimensions of the workpiece.

• The pendulum is raised to the left to the maximum point.
• The specimen is placed horizontally across supports with the notch away from the
pendulum side.
• Pendulum is released and allowed to move freely.
• The indicated value from the indicator unit is recorded.

• The brake is applied until the pendulum has returned to its stable hanging vertical
position.
• The specimen is removed from the testing area and failure surface is observed.

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5.2. OBSERVATIONS AND CALCULATIONS

Table 1

Specimen α1 α2 K T E E Fracture Kcu

practical
(˚) (˚) (J) (J) Theoretical Area (J/mm2)
(J)
(J) (mm2)

Carbon 162 86 15.55 7.34 8.21 7.9 18 0.456

steel

CALCULATIONS:

F = 2.1*9.8 = 20.5 N
L = 38.5 cm = 0.385 m
Fracture Area = 3*6 = 18mm2
Potential Energy of system when released = K = F*L * (1+sin (α1- α2))
= 20.5 * 0.385*(1+sin (162 ˚ -86 ˚))
= 15.55 J
Potential Energy of system after impact = T = F*L*(1-cos α2)
= 20.5*0.385*(1-cos86 ˚)
= 7.34 J
Energy consumed in breaking specimen = E = K-T
= 15.55 – 7.34
= 8.21 J
Impact strength = Kcu = E / Fracture Area
= 8.21 / 18
= 0.456 J / mm2

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6. RESULTS

• Initial Potential Energy of the system is 15.55J.

• Potential Energy of the system after impact is 7.34J.
• Energy consumed by specimen is 8.21J.
• Impact Strength is 0.456 J/mm2

7. DISCUSSION

Since we extracted limited data from this test so it is not possible to plot a graph.
We were demonstrated with mild steel specimen which did not shattered. So,
from the little data provided we made some results, as shown above.

8. CONCLUSIONS

From the Charpy impact test we conclude that carbon steel undergoes brittle
fracture while the mild steel undergoes ductile fracture. More energy is
absorbed by mild steel which shows that it is ductile and fractured surface
shows grainy fibrous texture. Therefore, it is more suitable to be use in the
structural construction that exposed to high load whereas Carbon steel
absorbs less energy and fractures when exposed to sudden high loads.
Fractured surface is shiny and smooth which confirms that Carbon steel
undergoes brittle fracture. To sum up the discussion; Ductile materials have
high impact energy as compared to Brittle materials.

9. REFERENCES

• http://staffweb.itsligo.ie/staff/dsheridan/Impact%20Test.pdf
• http://web.itu.edu.tr/~arana/charpyfatigue.pdf
• http://engin.swarthmore.edu/~rcarmic1/E59ImpactLab.pdf
• https://www.osti.gov/scitech/servlets/purl/469114