Thermal Shock Effects on Brittle-Ductile Materials

Thermal shock has different effects on brittle and ductile materials. The main reason may be explained by strains and energy. A brittle material can endure little strain before rupture. There is also a large surplus of elastic energy in brittle materials, which accelerates the crack to high speeds when they fail in thermal shock. On the other hand, ductile materials can usually withstand more strains and the plastic deformation will help the ductile materials to absorb more strain energy before failure occurs. Based on these reasons, the brittle materials usually fail in cracking abruptly and ductile materials usually fail in fatiguing slowly under thermal shocks. Different approaches are required to deal with thermal shock problems of brittle materials and ductile materials. A few important parameters described in connection with this problem are thermal shock-resistence, heat transfer conditions, crack and failure associated with brittle materials, the thermal cycles, material characteristics, surface effects, and plastic deformation associated with ductile materials.