Aluminum Mechanical Properties Aluminum 6061-T6; 6061-T651 Subcategory: 6000 Series Aluminum Alloy; Aluminum Alloy; Metal; Nonferrous Metal Close Analogs: Composition Notes: Aluminum content reported is calculated as remainder. Composition information provided by the Aluminum Association and is not for design. Key Words: al6061, UNS A96061; ISO AlMg1SiCu; Aluminium 6061-T6, AD-33 (Russia); AA6061-T6; 6061T6, UNS A96061; ISO AlMg1SiCu; Aluminium 6061-T651, AD-33 (Russia); AA6061-T651 Component Wt. % Al 95.8 - 98.6 Cr 0.04 - 0.35 Cu 0.15 - 0.4 Fe Max 0.7 Component Wt. % Mg 0.8 - 1.2 Mn Max 0.15 Other, each Max 0.05 Other, total Max 0.15 Component Wt. % Si 0.4 - 0.8 Ti Max 0.15 Zn Max 0.25 Material Notes: Information provided by Alcoa, Starmet and the references. General 6061
This document is posted to help you gain knowledge. Please leave a comment to let me know what you think about it! Share it to your friends and learn new things together.
Subcategory: 6000 Series Aluminum Alloy; Aluminum Alloy; Metal; Nonferrous Metal
Close Analogs:
Composition Notes: Aluminum content reported is calculated as remainder.Composition information provided by the Aluminum Association and is not for design.
Key Words: al6061, UNS A96061; ISO AlMg1SiCu; Aluminium 6061-T6, AD-33 (Russia); AA6061-T6; 6061T6, UNS A96061; ISO AlMg1SiCu; Aluminium 6061-T651, AD-33 (Russia); AA6061-T651
Component Wt. %
Al 95.8 - 98.6
Cr 0.04 - 0.35
Cu 0.15 - 0.4
Fe Max 0.7
Component
Wt. %
Mg 0.8 - 1.2
Mn Max 0.15
Other, each Max 0.05
Other, total Max 0.15
Component
Wt. %
Si 0.4 - 0.8
Ti Max 0.15
Zn Max 0.25
Material Notes: Information provided by Alcoa, Starmet and the references. General 6061 characteristics and uses: Excellent joining characteristics, good acceptance of applied coatings. Combines relatively high strength, good workability, and high resistance to corrosion; widely available. The T8 and T9 tempers offer better chipping characteristics over the T6 temper.
Applications: Aircraft fittings, camera lens mounts, couplings, marines fittings and hardware, electrical fittings and connectors, decorative or misc. hardware, hinge pins, magneto parts, brake pistons, hydraulic pistons, appliance fittings, valves and valve parts; bike frames.
Data points with the AA note have been provided by the Aluminum Association, Inc. and are NOT FOR DESIGN.
Physical Properties Metric English Comments
Density 2.7 g/cc 0.0975 lb/in³ AA; Typical
Mechanical Properties
Hardness, Brinell 95 95 AA; Typical; 500 g load; 10 mm ball
Hardness, Knoop 120 120 Converted from Brinell Hardness Value
Hardness, Rockwell A 40 40 Converted from Brinell Hardness Value
Hardness, Rockwell B 60 60 Converted from Brinell Hardness Value
Hardness, Vickers 107 107 Converted from Brinell Hardness Value
composition for wrought products 1/4 inch thickness or greater;
Eutectic melting can be completely eliminated by homogenization.
Solidus 582 °C 1080 °F AA; Typical
Liquidus 652 °C 1205 °F AA; Typical
Processing Properties
Solution Temperature 529 °C 985 °F
Aging Temperature 160 °C 320 °F Rolled or drawn products; hold at temperature for 18 hr
Aging Temperature 177 °C 350 °F Extrusions or forgings; hold at temperature for 8 h
BackgroundAluminium is the world’s most abundant metal and is the third most common element comprising 8% of the earth’s crust. The versatility of aluminium makes it the most widely used metal after steel.
Production of Aluminium
Aluminium is derived from the mineral bauxite. Bauxite is converted to aluminium oxide (alumina) via the Bayer Process. The alumina is then converted to aluminium metal using electrolytic cells and the Hall-Heroult Process.
Annual Demand of Aluminium
Worldwide demand for aluminium is around 29 million tons per year. About 22 million tons is new aluminium and 7 million tons is recycled aluminium scrap. The use of recycled aluminium is economically and environmentally compelling. It takes 14,000 kWh to produce 1 tonne of newaluminium. Conversely it takes only 5% of this to remelt and recycle one tonne of aluminium. There is no difference in quality between virgin and recycled aluminium alloys.
Pure aluminium is soft, ductile, corrosion resistant and has a high electrical conductivity. It is widely used for foil and conductor cables, but alloying with other elements is necessary to provide the higher strengths needed for other applications. Aluminium is one of the lightest engineering metals, having a strength to weight ratio superior to steel.
By utilising various combinations of its advantageous properties such as strength, lightness, corrosion resistance, recyclability and formability, aluminium is being employed in an ever-increasing number of applications. This array of products ranges from structural materials through to thin packaging foils.
Alloy Designations
Aluminium is most commonly alloyed with copper, zinc, magnesium, silicon, manganese and lithium. Small additions of chromium, titanium, zirconium, lead, bismuth and nickel are also made and iron is invariably present in small quantities.
There are over 300 wrought alloys with 50 in common use. They are normally identified by a four figure system which originated in the USA and is now universally accepted. Table 1 describes the system for wrought alloys. Cast alloys have similar designations and use a five digit system.
Table 1. Designations for wrought aluminium alloys.
Alloying ElementWrought
None (99%+ Aluminium) 1XXX
Copper 2XXX
Manganese 3XXX
Silicon 4XXX
Magnesium 5XXX
Magnesium + Silicon 6XXX
Zinc 7XXX
Lithium 8XXX
For unalloyed wrought aluminium alloys designated 1XXX, the last two digits represent the purity of the metal. They are the equivalent to the last two digits after the decimal point when aluminium purity is expressed to the nearest 0.01 percent. The second digit indicates modifications in impurity limits. If the second digit is zero, it indicates unalloyed aluminiumhaving natural impurity limits and 1 through 9, indicate individual impurities or alloying elements.
For the 2XXX to 8XXX groups, the last two digits identify different aluminium alloys in the group. The second digit indicates alloy modifications. A second digit of zero indicates the original alloy and integers 1 to 9 indicate consecutive alloy modifications.
Physical Properties of Aluminium
Density of Aluminium
Aluminium has a density around one third that of steel or copper making it one of the lightest commercially available metals. The resultant high strength to weight ratio makes it an important structural material allowing increased payloads or fuel savings for transport industries in particular.
Strength of Aluminium
Pure aluminium doesn’t have a high tensile strength. However, the addition of alloying elements like manganese, silicon, copper and magnesium can increase the strength properties of aluminium and produce an alloy with properties tailored to particular applications.
Aluminium is well suited to cold environments. It has the advantage over steel in that its’ tensile strength increases with decreasing temperature while retaining its toughness. Steel on the other hand becomes brittle at low temperatures.
Corrosion Resistance of Aluminium
When exposed to air, a layer of aluminium oxide forms almost instantaneously on the surface of aluminium. This layer has excellent resistance to corrosion. It is fairly resistant to most acids but less resistant to alkalis.
Thermal Conductivity of Aluminium
The thermal conductivity of aluminium is about three times greater than that of steel. This makes aluminium an important material for both cooling and heating applications such as heat-exchangers. Combined with it being non-toxic this property means aluminium is used extensively in cooking utensils and kitchenware.
Electrical Conductivity of Aluminium
Along with copper, aluminium has an electrical conductivity high enough for use as an electrical conductor. Although the conductivity of the commonly used conducting alloy (1350) is only around 62% of annealed copper, it is only one third the weight and can therefore conduct twice as much electricity when compared with copper of the same weight.
From UV to infra-red, aluminium is an excellent reflector of radiant energy. Visible light reflectivity of around 80% means it is widely used in light fixtures. The same properties of reflectivity makes aluminium ideal as an insulating material to protect against the sun’s rays in summer, while insulating against heat loss in winter.
Table 2. Typical properties for aluminium.
PropertyValue
Atomic Number 13
Atomic Weight (g/mol) 26.98
Valency 3
Crystal Structure FCC
Melting Point (°C) 660.2
Boiling Point (°C) 2480
Mean Specific Heat (0-100°C) (cal/g.°C) 0.219
Thermal Conductivity (0-100°C) (cal/cms. °C) 0.57
Co-Efficient of Linear Expansion (0-100°C) (x10-6/°C) 23.5
Electrical Resistivity at 20°C (Ω.cm) 2.69
Density (g/cm3) 2.6898
Modulus of Elasticity (GPa) 68.3
Poissons Ratio 0.34
Mechanical Properties of Aluminium
Aluminium can be severely deformed without failure. This allows aluminium to be formed by rolling, extruding, drawing, machining and other mechanical processes. It can also be cast to a high tolerance.
Alloying, cold working and heat-treating can all be utilised to tailor the properties of aluminium.
The tensile strength of pure aluminium is around 90 MPa but this can be increased to over 690 MPa for some heat-treatable alloys.
Table 3. Mechanical properties of selected aluminium alloys.
The old BS1470 standard has been replaced by nine EN standards. The EN standards are given in table 4.
Table 4. EN standards for aluminium
StandardScope
EN485-1 Technical conditions for inspection and delivery
EN485-2 Mechanical properties
EN485-3 Tolerances for hot rolled material
EN485-4 Tolerances for cold rolled material
EN515 Temper designations
EN573-1 Numerical alloy designation system
EN573-2 Chemical symbol designation system
EN573-3 Chemical compositions
EN573-4 Product forms in different alloys
The EN standards differ from the old standard, BS1470 in the following areas:
Chemical compositions – unchanged.
Alloy numbering system – unchanged.
Temper designations for heat treatable alloys now cover a wider range of special tempers. Up to four digits after the T have been introduced for non-standard applications (e.g. T6151).
Temper designations for non heat treatable alloys – existing tempers are unchanged but tempers are now more comprehensively defined in terms of how they are created. Soft (O) temper is now H111 and an intermediate temper H112 has been introduced. For alloy 5251 tempers are now shown as H32/H34/H36/H38 (equivalent to H22/H24, etc).
H19/H22 & H24 are now shown separately.
Mechanical properties – remain similar to previous figures. 0.2% Proof Stress must now be quoted on test certificates.
Tolerances have been tightened to various degrees.
Heat Treatment of Aluminium
A range of heat treatments can be applied to aluminium alloys:
Homogenisation – the removal of segregation by heating after casting.
Annealing – used after cold working to soften work-hardening alloys (1XXX, 3XXX and 5XXX).
Precipitation or age hardening (alloys 2XXX, 6XXX and 7XXX).
Solution heat treatment before ageing of precipitation hardening alloys.
Stoving for the curing of coatings
After heat treatment a suffix is added to the designation numbers.
The suffix F means “as fabricated”.
O means “annealed wrought products”.
T means that it has been “heat treated”.
W means the material has been solution heat treated.
H refers to non heat treatable alloys that are “cold worked” or “strain hardened”.
The non-heat treatable alloys are those in the 3XXX, 4XXX and 5XXX groups.
Table 5. Heat treatment designations for aluminium and aluminium alloys.
TermDescription
T1 Cooled from an elevated temperature shaping process and naturally aged.
T2 Cooled from an elevated temperature shaping process cold worked and naturally aged.
T3 Solution heat-treated cold worked and naturally aged to a substantially.
T4 Solution heat-treated and naturally aged to a substantially stable condition.
T5 Cooled from an elevated temperature shaping process and then artificially aged.
T6 Solution heat-treated and then artificially aged.
T7 Solution heat-treated and overaged/stabilised.
Work Hardening of Aluminium
The non-heat treatable alloys can have their properties adjusted by cold working. Cold rolling is a typical example.
These adjusted properties depend upon the degree of cold work and whether working is followed by any annealing or stabilising thermal treatment.
Nomenclature to describe these treatments uses a letter, O, F or H followed by one or more numbers. As outlined in Table 6, the first number refers to the worked condition and the second number the degree of tempering.
Table 6. Non-Heat treatable alloy designations
TermDescription
H1X Work hardened
H2X Work hardened and partially annealed
H3X Work hardened and stabilized by low temperature treatment
H4X Work hardened and stoved
HX2 Quarter-hard – degree of working
HX4 Half-hard – degree of working
HX6 Three-quarter hard – degree of working
HX8 Full-hard – degree of working
Table 7. Temper codes for plate
CodeDescription
H112Alloys that have some tempering from shaping but do not have special control over the amount of strain-hardening or
thermal treatment. Some strength limits apply.
H321 Strain hardened to an amount less than required for a controlled H32 temper.
H323 A version of H32 that has been hardened to provide acceptable resistance to stress corrosion cracking.
H343 A version of H34 that has been hardened to provide acceptable resistance to stress corrosion cracking.
H115 Armour plate.
H116 Special corrosion-resistant temper.
Mechanical Properties of Beryllium
DATA TABLE FOR: Non-ferrous Metals: Other Metals: BerylliumMechanical Properties
Quantity Value Unit
Young's modulus 280000 - 303000 MPa
Tensile strength 400 - 610 MPa
Elongation 2 - 5 %
Yield strength 310 - 380 MPa
Physical Properties
Quantity Value Unit
Thermal expansion 12 - 13 e-6/K
Thermal conductivity 150 - 170 W/m.K
Specific heat 1700 - 1780 J/kg.K
Melting temperature 1283 - 1287 °C
Density 1848 - 1850 kg/m3
Resistivity 0.033 - 0.05 Ohm.mm2/m
Electrochemical
potential
-1.85 - -1.85 V
Environmental Data
Quantity Value Unit
Environmental remarks Beryllium is found in about 30 minerals. Beryl and Bertrandite are the most
important commercial compounds.The metal is and its salts are toxic and
handling is only permitted with appropriate safeguards.
General
Remarks Beryllium is extremely hazardous and use should be prevented. It is one of the
bound to sulfonated hydroxybenzoquinoline, allowing up to 100 times more sensitive
detection than the recommended limit for beryllium concentration in the workplace.
Fluorescence increases with increasing beryllium concentration. The new procedure has
been successfully tested on a variety of surfaces and is effective for the dissolution and
ultratrace detection of refractory beryllium oxide and siliceous beryllium (ASTM D7458).[83][84]
Mechanical Properties of Stainless Steel
Background
Grade 316 is the standard molybdenum-bearing grade, second in importance to 304 amongst the austenitic stainless steels. The molybdenum gives 316 better overall corrosion resistant properties than Grade 304, particularly higher resistance to pitting and crevice corrosion in chloride environments. It has excellent forming and welding characteristics. It is readily brake or roll formed into a variety of parts for applications in the industrial, architectural, and transportation fields. Grade 316 also has outstanding welding characteristics. Post-weld annealing is not required when welding thin sections.
Grade 316L, the low carbon version of 316 and is immune from sensitisation (grain boundary carbide precipitation). Thus it is extensively used in heavy gauge welded components (over about 6mm). Grade 316H, with its higher carbon content has application at elevated temperatures, as does stabilised grade 316Ti.
The austenitic structure also gives these grades excellent toughness, even down to cryogenic temperatures.
Key Properties
These properties are specified for flat rolled product (plate, sheet and coil) in ASTM A240/A240M. Similar but not necessarily identical properties are specified for other products such as pipe and bar in their respective specifications.
Composition
Table 1. Composition ranges for 316 grade of stainless steels.
Table 2. Mechanical properties of 316 grade stainless steels.
Grade
Tensile Str
(MPa) min
Yield Str
0.2% Proof
(MPa) min
Elong
(% in 50mm)
min
Hardness
Rockwell B (HR
B) max
Brinell (HB) max
316 515 205 40 95 217
316L 485 170 40 95 217
316H 515 205 40 95 217
Note: 316H also has a requirement for a grain size of ASTM no. 7 or coarser.
Physical Properties
Table 3. Typical physical properties for 316 grade stainless steels.
Grade
Density
(kg/m3)
Elastic
Modulus
(GPa)
Mean Co-eff of Thermal
Expansion (µm/m/°C)
Thermal
Conductivity
(W/m.K)
Specific
Heat 0-
100°C
(J/kg.K)
Elec
Resistivit
y
(nΩ.m)
0-100°C 0-315°C 0-538°CAt
100°C
At
500°C
316/L/H 8000 193 15.9 16.2 17.5 16.3 21.5 500 740
Grade Specification Comparison
Table 4. Grade specifications for 316 grade stainless steels.
Grade
UNS
No
Old British Euronorm Swedish
SS
Japanese
JISBS En No Name
316 S31600 316S31 58H, 58J 1.4401X5CrNiMo17-
12-22347 SUS 316
316L S31603 316S11 - 1.4404X2CrNiMo17-
12-22348 SUS 316L
316H S31609 316S51 - - - - -
Note: These comparisons are approximate only. The list is intended as a comparison of functionally similar materials not as a schedule of contractual equivalents. If exact equivalents are needed original specifications must be consulted.
Possible Alternative Grades
Table 5. Possible alternative grades to 316 stainless steel.
GradeWhy it might be chosen instead of 316?
316Ti Better resistance to temperatures of around 600-900°C is needed.
316N Higher strength than standard 316.
317L Higher resistance to chlorides than 316L, but with similar resistance to stress corrosion cracking.
904L Much higher resistance to chlorides at elevated temperatures, with good formability
2205 Much higher resistance to chlorides at elevated temperatures, and higher strength than 316
Corrosion Resistance
Excellent in a range of atmospheric environments and many corrosive media - generally more resistant than 304. Subject to pitting and crevice corrosion in warm chloride environments, and to stress corrosion cracking above about 60°C. Considered resistant to potable water with up to about 1000mg/L chlorides at ambient temperatures, reducing to about 500mg/L at 60°C.
316 is usually regarded as the standard “marine grade stainless steel”, but it is not resistant to warm sea water. In many marine environments 316 does exhibit surface corrosion, usually visible as brown staining. This is particularly associated with crevices and rough surface finish.
Heat Resistance
Good oxidation resistance in intermittent service to 870°C and in continuous service to 925°C. Continuous use of 316 in the 425-860°C range is not recommended if subsequent aqueous corrosion resistance is important. Grade 316L is more resistant to carbide precipitation and can be used in the above temperature range. Grade 316H has higher strength at elevated temperatures and is sometimes used for structural and pressure-containing applications at temperatures above about 500°C.
Heat Treatment
Solution Treatment (Annealing) - Heat to 1010-1120°C and cool rapidly. These grades cannot be hardened by thermal treatment.
Welding
Excellent weldability by all standard fusion methods, both with and without filler metals. AS 1554.6 pre-qualifies welding of 316 with Grade 316 and 316L with Grade 316L rods or electrodes (or their high silicon equivalents). Heavy welded sections in Grade 316 require post-weld annealing for maximum corrosion resistance. This is not required for 316L. Grade 316Ti may also be used as an alternative to 316 for heavy section welding.
Machining
A “Ugima” improved machinability version of grade 316 is available in round and hollow bar products. This machines significantly better than standard 316 or 316L, giving higher machining rates and lower tool wear in many operations.
Dual Certification
It is common for 316 and 316L to be stocked in "Dual Certified" form - mainly in plate and pipe. These items have chemical and mechanical properties complying with both 316 and 316L specifications. Such dual certified product does not meet 316H specification and may be unacceptable for high temperature applications.
Applications
Typical applications include:
• Food preparation equipment particularly in chloride environments.