ABSTRACT
This chapter offers a summary review of the most common engineering materials and the properties typically most important to the mechanical designer. In addition to strong emphasis on metals, it addresses wood, concrete, plastics, and composites. The chapter presents information concerning the materials most frequently used to make components for structures and mechanical devices, and highlights the design properties of the materials rather than their metallurgical structure or chemical composition. Designers must understand how materials react to externally applied loads to develop effective machines, structures, and consumer products. The study of strength of materials requires knowledge of how external forces and moments affect the stresses and deformations developed in the material of a load-carrying member. The tensile strength and yield strength are determined by testing a sample of the material in a tensile-testing machine. An outstanding feature of gray iron is that its compressive strength is very high, about three to five times as high as the tensile strength.
