Strain Measurement MEASUREMENT EXPERIMENT
1. OBJECT
The objective of this experiment is to become familiar with the electric resistance strain gage
techniques and utilize such gages for the determination of unknown quantities (such as strain and
stress) at prescribed conditions of a cantilever beam
2. INTRODUCTION
Experimental stress analysis is an important tool in the design and testing of many products.
Several practical techniques are available including photoelastic, coatings and models, brittle
coatings, and electrical resistance strain gages.
In this experiment the strain gage will be utilized. There are three steps in obtaining
experimental strain measurements using a strain gage:
1. Selecting a strain gage
2. Mounting the gage on the test structure and
3. Measuring strains corresponding to specific loads.
The operation and selection criteria for strain gages will be discussed in this introduction. In
this experiment, you will mount a strain gage on a beam and test its accuracy. Measurements will
be made with a strain gage rosette in this experiment to obtain the principal stresses and strains on a
cantilevered beam.
Strain Gages:
There are many types of strain gages. The fundamental structure of a strain gage consists of a
grid-shaped sensing element of thin metallic resistive foil (3 to 6 microns thick) that is sandwiched
between a base of thin plastic film (12-16 micron thick) and a covering or lamination of thin film.
Thin Film Laminate
Resistive Foil
Plastic Base
Figure 1: Strain Gage
Construction
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Strain Gage Operation:
When needed for testing the strain gage is tightly bonded to the structural element under
test. This ensures that the sensing element (the metallic resistive foil at the center of the
“sandwich”) may elongate or contract in the same manner as the strain experienced by the test
article. Typically the sensing element is made of a copper-nickel alloy foil. When experiencing a
contraction or elongation, most metals undergo a change in electrical resistance. The alloy foil has a
rate of resistance change that, with a certain constant, is proportional to the strain. The strain gage is
therefore a measuring device that applies the principle of resistance change as a means to
effectively sense strain.
3. THEORY
What’s a Strain Gage Used For? Structural Element of
The Birdman Contest is an annual event held on Lake Biwa near Benicia-Martinez Bridge in
Kyoto, Japan. In this contest cleverly designed human-powered Southern California
airplanes and gliders fly several hundred meters across the lake. Undergoing a Load Test
Aside from the great spectacle of this event, it is a wonderful view of
engineering experimentation and competition. Despite the careful
designs and well-balanced airframes occasionally the wings of these
vehicles fail and crash into the lake. There have been some
spectacular crashes but few, if any, injuries to the contestants.
Increasingly, each time a new airplane, automobile, or other vehicle is
introduced, the structure of such vehicles is designed to be lighter to
attain faster running speeds and less fuel consumption. It is possible
to design a lighter and more efficient product by selecting light-weight
materials. However, as with all technology, there are plusses and
minuses to be balanced. If a structural material is made lighter or
thinner the safety of the vehicle is compromised unless the required
strength is maintained. By the same token, if only the strength is
taken into consideration, the vehicle’s weight will increase and its
economic feasibility is compromised. Picture of A Strain Gage
Attached to Bridge Element
In engineering design the balance between safety and economics is
one variable in the equation of creating a successful product. While
attempting to design a component or vehicle that provides the
appropriate strength it is important to understand the stress borne by
the various parts under different conditions. However, there is no
technology or test tool that allows direct measurement of stress.
Thus, strain on the surface is frequently measured in order to
determine internal stress. Strain gages are the most common
instrument to measure surface strain.
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Strain Measurement
It should be noted that there are various types of strain measuring
methods available. These may be roughly classified into
mechanical, electrical, and even optical techniques.
From a geometric perspective, strain recorded during any test
may be regarded as a distance change between two points on a
test article. Thus all techniques are simply a way of measuring
this change in distance.
If the elastic modulus of the test article’s constituent material is
known, strain measurement will allow calculation of stress. As
you have learned from your studies and prior labs strain
measurement is often performed to determine the stress created This LVDT, attached to a tensile
in a test article by some external force, rather than to simply gain specimen, is also a common tool
knowledge of the strain value itself. for measuring strain.
A resistance strain gage consists of a thin strain-sensitive wire mounted on a backing that
insulates the wire from the test structure. Strain gages are calibrated with a gage factor F, which
relates strain to the resistance change in the wire by
F = R/R F = R/R
L/L L/L
where R is the resistance and L is the length of the wire. The change in resistance
corresponding to typical values of strain is usually only a fraction of an ohm
The Wheatstone Bridge
A Wheatstone bridge is a measuring instrument that, despite
popular myth, was not invented by Sir Charles Wheatstone, but
by Samuel H. Christie in 1833. The device was later improved
upon and popularized by Wheatstone. The bridge is used to
measure an unknown electrical resistance by balancing two legs
of a circuit, one leg of which includes the unknown component
that is to be measured. The Wheatstone bridge illustrates the
concept of a difference measurement, which can be extremely
accurate. Variations on the Wheatstone bridge can be used to
measure capacitance, inductance, and impedence.
In a typical Wheatstone configuration, Rx is the unknown
resistance to be measured; R1, R2 and R3 are resistors of
known resistance and the resistance of R2 is adjustable. If the
ratio of the two resistances in the known leg (R2/R1) is equal to
the ratio of the two in the unknown leg (Rx/R3), then the voltage
between the two midpoints will be zero and no current will flow
between the midpoints. R2 is varied until this condition is Typical Wheatstone Bridge
reached. The current direction indicates if R2 is too high or too diagram with strain gage at Rx
low.
Detecting zero current can be done to extremely high accuracy.
Therefore, if R1, R2 and R3 are known to high precision, then Rx
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can be measured to high precision. Very small changes in Rx
disrupt the balance and are readily detected.
Alternatively, if R1, R2, and R3 are known, but R2 is not
adjustable, the voltage or current flow through the meter can be
used to calculate the value of Rx. This setup is what you will use
in strain gage measurements, as it is usually faster to read a
voltage level off a meter than to adjust a resistance to zero the
voltage.
Because conventional ohmmeters are not capable of measuring these small changes in
resistance accurately, a Wheatstone bridge is usually employed. It can be operated in either a
balanced or unbalanced configuration. The configuration for an unbalanced bridge is shown in
Figure 3. For an unbalanced bridge, a change in resistance is measured as a non-zero voltage Vo
which, can be calibrated in standard strain units (∆L/L x 10-6) or micro strain. A balanced bridge is
rebalanced after each load increment so that the output voltage Vo is zero. The appropriate changes
in resistance are then noted and strain calculated using the gage factor.
4. EXPERIMENTS TO BE PERFORMED
Mounting and Use of A Strain Gage
Surface preparation has five component steps:
1) solvent degreasing
2) surface abrasion
3) application of layout lines for gage
4) surface conditioning
5) neutralizing
Note: the gage and terminal is first transferred to a clear glass plate using the tweezers.
Figure 2 shows the strain gage and tabs under the tape that is then used to transfer them to (and
align them on) the beam. After aligning the gage, carefully lift one side of the tape so the gage
is off the surface of the beam. Apply M-Bond 200 catalyst onto the gage and along the tape-
beam junction and press the gage onto the beam as described in the manual. Remove the tape.
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Strain Gage
Connector Tabs
Figure 2: Strain Gage and Tabs under tape on beam
Making Measurements with the Strain Gage
The beam with the strain gage you have just attached will be placed in the Cantilever Flexure Frame
to take strain measurements. The arrangement is schematically shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3. Beam with Strain Gage in Flexure Fixture
An interesting use of the strain gage is in a load cell. Typically load cells are used to measure loads
in one direction. In actual set-ups, load cells are calibrated in two ways. The first way is in which
the load cell bridge is calibrated by a shunt calibration technique. This is where a known precision
resistor is placed across the terminals of the strain gage. A formula determines what the reading
should be across the bridge. The value of the output is then interpreted from that reading to give a
reading in lb, kg, etc.
The second method of calibration is known as dead weight calibration. This type of calibration is
significantly easier and also aids the user in believing the reading produced from the set-up. The
load cell (bridge) is balanced from a no-load state. Now increments of weights are added and the
potential across the bridge is recorded. The corresponding weight to potential values are recorded
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and used as a formula for determining unknown loads. This may seem like more physical work, but
once again it provides a sense of security in seeing that the loads placed on the cell have a certain
conformable value.
The first structure examined in this experiment is the cantilever beam. A beam under bending can
be characterized by equation (1).
1 𝑀
= 𝐸𝐼 (1)
𝜌
The radius of curvature is given by equation (2)
𝑑2 𝑦⁄
𝑑𝑥 2
1
= 3/2 (2)
𝜌 𝑑𝑦⁄ 2
(1+( 𝑑𝑥) )
where y is the deflection in the y direction at any given point x along the beam. For many problems,
the deflection is very small. This means that the denominator can be neglected in most cases.
Combining equations (2) and (3) yields.
𝑀 𝑑2 𝑦
= 𝑑𝑥 2 (3)
𝐸𝐼
This further reduces to a convenient form of the equation for stress in the cantilever beam.
𝑀𝑦
𝜎= (4)
𝐼
An equation of the strain in the beam can be written considering any point in the beam. Equation (1)
has been derived through fundamentals of mechanics. The parameters in these two equations
involve discrete physical values with no inclusion of “mysterious” correction factors. What’s
significant about this point is that theory will predict (very closely) what we actually see in the
loading of the structure. The case of the cantilever beam is a simple introduction to this argument.
The same principles and analyses applied to the cantilever beam can be applied to more
complicated structures. This results in a compounding of the confirmation of theoretically derived
equations through experimentation. Solutions for the remaining structures can be found in most
solid mechanics textbooks and therefore no additional information will be provided in this manual
for their identification.
Also, there should be some observation about the usability and reliability of the relatively crude
instrumentation involved in the experiment. In most cases, strain values differ at most by 5µstrain
from the actual values. In most of the experiments here, that relates to much less than an ounce of
resolution. In the laboratory most load cells typically fall within 0.5 % error.
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5. REPORT
In your laboratory reports must have the followings;
a) Cover
b) A short introduction
c) All the necessary calculations using measured data.
d) Discussion of your results and a conclusion.
6. REFERENCES
