TAKUDZWA MUKAVHI

I.M.E

H150169C

Solid Mechanic 1

Assignment 1
Question

1) Giving examples, explain the following terms in detail:

a) Stress
b) Strain
c) Elasticity
d) Factor of safety
e) Thermal stresses

Answers

1)

a) Stress is defined as the force per unit area applied to a material.

- An object can undergo a maximum stress known as the breaking stress.

- An object can experience Normal stress, which acts perpendicular to a surface i.e. can be tension
or compression.

- Tensile stress - where the forces acting on the object are trying to pull it apart i.e. stretch.

- Compressive stress - where the forces acting on it are trying to push the material together i.e.
squash or squeeze.

- An object can experience Shear stress, which acts parallel to a surface. Can cause object to slide
over each other.

Stress = force area

= FA ; where is stress in N m2

F is the force in N

A is the cross-sectional area under which the force is acting, m2

Units N m2

Examples
Fig1: types of stress (http://hep.physics.wayne.edu)

Compressive stress: simplest example is when a person sits on the chair, the legs of the chair will
experience a stress due to them being squeezed between the floor and the person.

Tensile stress: is experienced in a rope that is being used for tug-o-war.

b) Strain is defined as the ratio of extension to original length

- can also be defined as the measure of how objects react to stress.

- Strain can either be compressive, tension, shear or linear.

Compression shortens an object.

Tension lengthens an object.
Shear changes angles of objects.
Linear changes the length of a line without changing its direction

-has no units since the dimensions of the parameters cancel each other

Strain = extension / length

 . = L L

Where . Is the strain

L is the change in length

L is the original length

No units

Examples

Fig 2: strain (http://www.angelfire.com)

c) Elasticity

-is defined as the ability of a body or material to retain its normal shape and size spontaneously
after a stress or strain.

- Hookes law states that, stress is directly proportional to strain

Stress Strain
 Stress/strain = constant
This equation is used to obtain the relationship between stress and strain of a material with
respect to the load that is applied to the material
This results in a constant known as young modulus

E= stress/strain

= F/A/ L/L
=F*L/A*L

Fig3: elasticity(http://www.schoolphysics.co.uk)

d) Factor of safety.

- defined as the ratio of the allowable working stress to the working stress.

-it is also a term which describes the load carrying capacity of any given system beyond the
expected loads, shown in the formula

FoS = Sm/Sw

Where FoS is the factor of safety

Sw is the working stress

Sm is the allowable working unit stress

Examples

Factor of safety are mainly applied on major products such as bridges and buildings though the
structures ability to carry a load must be determined to a reasonable accuracy.

e) Thermal stress

-thermal stress is as a result of temperature changes

- Most materials expand at temperature increase and contract at temperature decrease

- can be explained using the following equation

F = *t*E
Where f = thermal stress

=thermal coefficient

t =temperature change

E = elastic modulus

REFERENCES

http://hep.physics.wayne.edu/~harr/courses/5210/w15/lecture37.htm

http://www.angelfire.com/nc3/pweb/lessons/stress.htm

http://www.schoolphysics.co.uk/age14-16/Matter/text/Elasticity_/index.html