title: Effect of Loading Rate Upon Conventional Ceramic Microindentation Hardness.
abstract: The world standards for conventional ceramic hardness have varying requirements for control of loading rate during the indentation cycle. A literature review suggests that loading rate may affect measured hardness in some instances. In view of the uncertainty over this issue, new experiments over a range of indentation loading rates were performed on a steel, sintered silicon carbide, and an aluminum oxynitride. There was negligible effect upon Vickers hardness when loading rate was varied by almost four orders of magnitude from approximately 0.03 N/s to 10 N/s.
authors.affiliation: National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8521.
authors.forename: George D
authors.initials: GD
authors.lastname: Quinn
authors.affiliation: Weapons and Material Directorate, Army Research Laboratory, Aberdeen, MD 21005.
authors.forename: Parimal J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Patel
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials and Nuclear Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 21742.
authors.forename: Isabel
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Lloyd
keywords: aluminum oxynitride; hardness; loading rate; silicon carbide