A novel model for determining tensile properties and hardness of steels by spherical indentations

An energy-based spherical indentation (ESI) model according to equivalent energy principle is developed to determine the stress-strain relation, tensile strength and hardness of steels. Several parameters in the model are determined with finite element analysis (FEA). For a wide range of homogeneous and isotropic materials in power stress-strain law, a large number of FEA calculations are carried out to verify the ESI model. Results show that both the forward-predicted load-depth relations and the reverse-predicted stress-strain relations from the model agree well with the results from FEA. For 12 steels, the tensile properties, Rockwell and Brinell hardness predicted by the ESI model are close to the standard testing results.