Materials Science and Engineering A297 (2001) 4447

On the correlation between hardness and tensile strength in

particle reinforced metal matrix composites
Y.-L. Shen
a,
*, N. Chawla
b
a
Department of Mechanical Engineering, The Uni6ersity of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131, USA
b
Mechanical Beha6ior of Materials Laboratory, Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering, Arizona State Uni6ersity, Tempe,
AZ 85287-6006, USA
Received 28 March 2000; received in revised form 20 June 2000
Abstract
The correlation between macrohardness and tensile strength of particle reinforced metal matrix composites was studied.
Contrary to monolithic metals, a simple relationship between hardness and tensile strength was not found. The reinforcement
fraction and matrix strength appear to play an important role in inuencing the behavior of the composite under hardness and
tensile loading conditions. The different loading modes of the tensile test compared to the hardness test, along with the local
increase in particle concentration directly underneath the indenter during indentation, result in a signicant overestimation of the
tensile strength by the hardness test, especially when the matrix strength is relatively low. 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights
reserved.
Keywords: Hardness; Composites; Aluminum; Fracture; Tensile strength
www.elsevier.com/locate/msea
1. Introduction
Hardness tests are routinely employed as a simple
and effective means of estimating the mechanical
strength of metallic materials [1,2]. The correlation
between various hardness scales and tensile strength has
been compiled for a variety of metals and alloys [3]. As
metal matrix composites are generating increased inter-
est for applications where quality control may be im-
portant, it is essential to understand the relationship
between hardness and tensile strength in such class of
materials.
In a study of a 6061/SiC/10
p
aluminum composite
(we follow the standard notation for metallic com-
posites, designated by the Aluminum Association: the
matrix alloy is followed by the reinforcement composi-
tion; the latter is denoted as a particulate reinforcement
by the subscript p; the volume fraction can also be
introduced in this notation, e.g. 6061 matrix reinforced
with 20% SiC would be denoted as 6061/SiC/20
p
.) with
various aging treatments [4] a linear relationship be-
tween the Rockwell supercial-scale hardness and the
ultimate tensile strength of the composite was reported.
More recently we have explored this possible correla-
tion in greater detail, by taking into account varying
reinforcement volume fractions, particle sizes, and ma-
trix microstructures in a 2080/SiC
p
composite system
[5]. It was found that the correlation between hardness
and tensile strength is not straightforward. This is
particularly true for composites with large reinforce-
ment particles that are more prone to fracture during
deformation processing. While fractured particles in
tension do not bear any applied load, they do not
signicantly alter the resistance to local compressive
loading in a macrohardness test. As a result, the hard-
ness test can signicantly overestimate the overall ten-
sile strength of the composite [5].
In an attempt to investigate the hardnessstrength
correlation without the inuence of pre-existing particle
fracture, in this study we focus on composites contain-
ing relatively smaller particles that were not subject to
cracking during deformation processing. Particular at-
tention is devoted to the combined effects of reinforce-
ment concentration and aging treatment. In this paper
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +1-505-2776286; fax: +1-505-
2771571.
E-mail address: shenyl@me.unm.edu (Y.-L. Shen).
0921-5093/01/$ - see front matter 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PII: S0921- 5093( 00) 01256- 9
Y.-L. Shen, N. Chawla / Materials Science and Engineering A297 (2001) 4447 45
we illustrate that, even in the absence of prominent
processing-induced particle fracture, no unique correla-
tion exists between hardness and tensile strength. In
particular, the combined effect of reinforcement volume
fraction and matrix strength appears to play an impor-
tant role in affecting the hardnesstensile strength
relationship.
2. Materials and experimental procedure
A 2080 Al alloy (3.6 Mg, 1.9 Cu, 0.25 Zr), unrein-
forced and reinforced with 10 and 20 vol.% SiC parti-
cles, were used in this study. All materials were
processed by the powder metallurgy route and extruded
(Alcoa Technical Center, Alcoa, PA). The average rein-
forcement particle size, after extrusion, was about 56
mm. Due to the small SiC particle size a relatively small
fraction of particles were fractured after extrusion. A
detailed characterization of the reinforcement size, dis-
tribution and morphology can be found elsewhere [6,7].
A T8 thermomechanical treatment [8] was applied to
the composites and the unreinforced alloy. The materi-
als were solution treated at 493C, quenched in water,
cold rolled to 5% reduction in thickness, and aged at
175C for 24 h (to the peakage condition). The rolling
step provides a homogeneous distribution of disloca-
tions that serve as sites for heterogeneous nucleation of
precipitates. This results in nearly identical microstruc-
tures in the composite and the monolithic alloy [9], so
preferential precipitation at the particle/matrix interface
in the composite, due to processing-induced thermal
stresses, can be avoided. Some peakaged materials were
heat-treated further to the overaged condition for 24 h
each at 200, 225, and 250C.
Low-stress grinding was used in machining the cylin-
drical tensile test specimens. The gage diameter of the
specimens was 5.08 mm. An extensometer with a gage
length of 12.7 mm was used. Tensile tests were con-
ducted on a servohydraulic load frame at a strain rate
of 10
3
s
1
. The standard Rockwell B-scale test, fea-
turing a 1.588 mm-diameter spherical steel indenter,
was used to characterize the hardness [10]. The Rock-
well B-scale hardness test is commonly applied to quan-
tifying the mechanical strength of a wide variety of Al
alloys, due to its speed, reproducibility, and relatively
small size of the indentation. A minor load and a major
load of 10 kg and 100 kg, respectively, were imposed on
the LT-plane of the heat-treated material, with L and T
designating the longitudinal and transverse directions,
respectively. The hardness value (HRB) was directly
determined by the depth of indentation beyond the
minor load.
3. Results and discussion
Fig. 1 shows the microstructure of the depressed
region caused by indentation of a hardness-tested 2080/
SiC/20
p
-T8 composite. Note that the indented region is
large compared to the size and spacing between the
particles. Thus, the indentation measures the overall
response of the material and is relatively insensitive to
localized effects. Very few cracked particles were ob-
served directly below or away from the indentation.
In presenting the hardness and strength data we have
included hardness values and ultimate tensile strengths
for all peakaged and overaged materials in one plot.
The ultimate tensile strength was chosen over the yield
strength because post-yield work hardening plays an
important role during indentation and in tensile load-
ing. During indentation signicant work hardening
takes place due to severe and nonuniform plastic defor-
mation in the vicinity of the indentation site [11,12]. A
direct comparison of hardness and tensile strength has
also been documented for several monolithic metals
and alloys [3]. While the Rockwell hardness scale was
used in these measurements, other hardness scales are
expected to yield qualitatively similar results to those
presented in this work.
Fig. 2 shows the true ultimate tensile strength as a
function of hardness (HRB) for the composites with 10
and 20 vol.% SiC particles and the monolithic 2080
alloy. The points in the upper-right end of the three
curves correspond to the peakaged materials, showing
the tensile strength and hardness increase with increas-
ing reinforcement volume fraction. Also included in the
gure are data associated with the three overaged con-
ditions described above. For each composite the tensile
strength and hardness decrease signicantly with the
extent of overaging.
The most important nding shown in Fig. 2 is that
the data do not follow a simple relationship as with
monolithic metals. With increasing overaging the differ-
Fig. 1. Optical micrograph of the 2080/SiC/20
p
-T8 composite near the
indentation site.
Y.-L. Shen, N. Chawla / Materials Science and Engineering A297 (2001) 4447 46
Fig. 2. Relationship between true ultimate tensile strength and Rockwell B-scale hardness of the composites and monolithic alloy. Data from the
peakaged and overaged states are indicated.
ence in tensile strength of the three materials is reduced,
but the disparity in hardness increases signicantly.
This suggests that the typical method of using hardness
testing to estimate the tensile strength may not be
applicable to particle reinforced metal matrix com-
posites. In the overaged condition, the composite with a
higher reinforcement fraction shows a much greater
hardness value, although its tensile strength may be
comparable to those with lower particle fractions. In
other words, when the strength of the Al matrix is
relatively low a wide range of hardness exists even when
all materials were heat-treated to the same tensile
strength. The similar tensile strengths, despite varying
volume fractions of SiC, indicate that in the overaged
condition the composite tensile strength is matrix dom-
inated. This can be explained by the fact that as the
matrix strength decreases, load transfer to the high
modulus particles is diminished. A lower-strength ma-
trix also renders a more prominent effect of reinforce-
ment under indentation. This is understandable because
a higher concentration of SiC signicantly increases the
resistance to ow of the matrix during indentation [9].
Thus, in the overaged condition tensile strength is
controlled by matrix strength, and hardness by the
volume fraction of reinforcement.
The above results imply that the presence of rein-
forcement particles signicantly alters the intrinsic
hardnessstrength correlation observed in the unrein-
forced alloy. If the matrix strength is high, the effect is
diminished, as shown by the convergence of the three
curves in Fig. 2 in the peakage regime.
There are two possible factors that can contribute to
the lack of unique correspondence between hardness
and tensile strength. First, in particle reinforced Al
matrix composites nal failure due to tensile loading is
often initiated by the fracture of the reinforcement
particles. In composites essentially free of pre-existing
fractured particles before testing, particle fracture can
develop during the tensile test, and the propensity of
particle fracture increases with the reinforcement frac-
tion [1319]. In a hardness test, however, deformation
is localized in regions around the indentation, within
which the particles experience compressive stresses with
a high degree of triaxiality [5]. As a consequence,
particle fracture induced by indentation is largely sup-
pressed. The hardness test thus tends to show a
strengthening effect with increasing fraction of parti-
cles, because of the absence of tensile fracture of
particles.
Another explanation to rationalize the experimental
ndings is related to the localized nature of indentation
Y.-L. Shen, N. Chawla / Materials Science and Engineering A297 (2001) 4447 47
Fig. 3. Schematic illustrating the local increase in particle concentra-
tion due to indentation.
ceived materials was avoided. It was found that a
unique relationship between hardness and tensile
strength does not exist, especially in cases where the
matrix strength is relatively low. The reinforcement
fraction also appears to play an important role in
affecting the hardnessstrength relation. The different
deformation damage modes of the tensile test compared
to the hardness test, and a local increase in particle
concentration directly underneath the indenter during
indentation, result in a signicant overestimation of the
tensile strength by the hardness test.
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to W.H. Hunt, Jr., of Alu-
minum Consultants Inc., for supplying the materials
used in this study.
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loading. During a tensile or compressive test, the mate-
rial within the gauge section undergoes nominally uni-
form deformation. In a hardness test, however, severe
plastic ow is concentrated in the localized region
directly below the indentation, outside of which the
material still behaves elastically (and can accommodate
a part of the volume loss caused by the depression [20]).
Directly below the indentation the density of particles is
forced to increase, compared to regions away from the
depression. This is schematically shown in Fig. 3.
Clearly, as the indenter moves downward during the
test, it encounters resistance from a material with an
increasingly greater concentration of hard particles.
This phenomenon may be a result of apparent work
hardening, since the higher work hardening rate in the
indentation region may be attributed solely to the pres-
ence of the particles in reducing the amount of matrix
material being deformed, and not to changing the in-
trinsic work hardening mechanism, which would be
present in an unreinforced material as well. Conse-
quently, the hardness value increases due to the local
increase in particle concentration associated with inden-
tation. If there is an intrinsic correlation between hard-
ness and strength for the metal matrix, then, for the
composite, the hardness value will tend to overestimate
the measured strength. This experimental artifact is
consistent with the trend observed in Fig. 2. In particu-
lar, with a decreasing matrix strength the effect of
reinforcement becomes more prominent. Detailed nite
element modeling is underway to quantitatively charac-
terize this effect.
4. Summary
In an attempt to explore the correlation between
macrohardness and tensile strength of particle rein-
forced metal matrix composites we have conducted
measurements on the 2080/SiC/10
p
and 2080/SiC/20
p
composites as well as the monolithic 2080 Al alloy. The
composites used in this study have small SiC particles,
so processing-induced particle fracture in the as-re-
.