Ever wondered what the toughest and strongest material in the world could be?
Well, the idea of having the hardest material in the world often occurs to many individuals, especially if you manufacture products or components which are in constant contact with enormous forces. The need to overcome these forces, among other things, can be why you might want to find the hardest material in the world to help you take care of these forces. This article presents some of the hardest material you can find today.
I. What are the Types of Strength for Metals?
Metals are often categorized based on their properties and several parameters. However, the most important ones for engineers and metallurgists, which indicates a metal’s suitability for engineering and manufacturing purposes, are highlighted below.
- Tensile Strength – Depending on the type of force applied to metal, the ability to withstand these forces without any deformation shows the metal’s strength level. However, when the force pulls the metal along its length to cause some material elongation, this is often known as tensile force. The ability to resist the elongation effect of the applied force is known as tensile strength. Some materials like steel have elastic properties and can resist the elongation effect of these forces. Some of these materials are often used to reinforce other materials, like concrete with very low tensile strength.
- Compressive Strength – This is often considered the opposite of tensile strength. The reason is that compressive strength is the ability to resist the effect of shortening the length of a material when a compressive force acts on it to shorten its length. Often, failure of material can occur because of an applied compressive force if the material has very low compressive strength. It is usually not the case to find a material with high compressive and tensile strength. Rather, materials with high tensile strength are used to strengthen materials with low but high compressive strength.
- Yield Strength – For elastic materials like steel, applying a force often causes it to change shape temporarily before returning to its original shape after removing the force. However, there is a limit at which the continuous application of such force can cause permanent deformation of the material. The yield strength is the ability of a material to resist a permanent deformation on the application of an external force. Knowing the highest force that a material can comfortably accept without a permanent deformation is often critical for designing structures that use elastic materials like steel in their design and construction. An example of these types of structures is steel reinforced concrete structures.
- Impact Strength – The impact of a force is often the reaction of a material to a sudden application of a force. The sudden application of this force can cause several failures, including permanent deformation and collapse of materials if the material’s impact strength is low. Hence, a material’s impact strength is its ability to overcome an unexpected application of force with any deformation or failure. In other words, the material can absorb mechanical energy.
II. What is the Strongest Material in the World?
Here are some of the world’s hardest materials, many of which are used in several industries to overcome the application of excessive forces and to avoid material and component failures.
- Graphene – As a carbon-based material, Graphene is a naturally occurring material often considered the hardest material in the world as it requires an enormous amount of force to break down. Though very thin since it has only one layer of an atom, it is extremely tough and shares certain similarities with a diamond which is also a carbon-based material.
- Diamond – Also a carbon-based naturally occurring material, Diamond is so tough that it is used as a cutting tool for some of the hardest materials in the world, including rocks. It even has the highest hardness of 10 on the Mohs hardness scale. Only a diamond can cut a diamond as very few materials are harder than a diamond.
- Inconel – Compared to some of the hardest utility industrial materials like high yield steel, Inconel has higher tensile strength, almost twice that of high yield steel. What’s more, it has a consistent tensile strength at very high temperatures up to 2,000°F, making it suitable for certain welding applications and other specific industrial uses. However, it is very expensive and only used when there are no alternatives.
- Chromium – As the third hardest material in the world, chromium is very expensive and has a hardness value of 8.5 on the Mohs hardness scale, just behind diamond and boron. Still, chromium is used to determine the hardness value of other materials during a Mohs hardness test.
- Titanium – This is one material that is both strong and light simultaneously. Its uses are numerous within the manufacturing industry as it has a hardness value of 36 on the Rockwell C hardness scale.
- Steel – As an alloy of iron and carbon, steel is a very versatile industrial material with varying hardness values depending on its use. It has high tensile strength, making it a good reinforcing material for supporting other materials with low tensile strength, like concrete. It is also inexpensive in comparison to other strong materials.
- Tungsten – With a hardness value of 9 on the Mohs hardness scale, Tungsten is only surpassed by Diamond on the Mohs scale. It is often used in many cutting and indenting tools, especially its tungsten carbide version.
- Lonsdaleite – Found by an American geologist, Lonsdaleite, is a meteorite diamond which means it is carbon-based and very strong. However, it differs from a diamond in the arrangement of its atoms.
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Conclusion
In conclusion, the materials listed above are the hardest materials engineers and manufacturers worldwide have tested and confirmed their strengths. These strengths can be tensile, compressive, yield, or impact strength. Furthermore, scientists and engineers are still studying other uses of these materials to fully take advantage of their other properties. Also, some of these materials can be very expensive, so manufacturers and producers often prefer their alternative to reduce production costs. Ultimately, you only want to use these materials if there are no alternatives and their strength is important for your purposes.