Question

What is the breaking stress of brittle materials?

(a) Y/6

(b) Y/10

(c) Y/100

(d) Y/1000

This question was posed to me during a job interview.

I need to ask this question from Types of Fracture topic in chapter Imperfection in Metal Crystals, Fracture, Corrosion and Oxidation of Engineering Material & Metallurgy

Answer 1

Correct answer is (d) Y/1000

Easiest explanation: It was found that the tensile strength of two adjacent atomic planes was Y/6. However, brittle materials may break at a stress of the order of Y/1000. Here, Y is Young’s modulus.