Application of Basic Material Tests for Evaluating New Engineering Materials

Recently, two new families of steels, strand cast steel and microalloyed steel, have become available to engineers. This paper briefly describes these materials and shows how basic material tests, fatigue, fracture toughness, etc., can be used to evaluate potential applications of the materials and minimize full-scale component testing by increased understanding of basic material properties. Axial fatigue and fracture toughness tests are shown to be reliable indicators of material performance in components while Charpy V-notch energy is of little value for quantitative engineering analysis. An alternative impact test which more closely represents material behavior in components is discussed.