What you will learn in Mechanical Properties of Solids

1. 1. Force per Area, Length per Length

   Both quantities are ratios, and dividing the geometry out is what turns a fact about one wire into a fact about steel.

2. 2. The Whole Curve

   Elastic limit, yield, ultimate strength, fracture. Four landmarks, and only the first is where most people think it is.

3. 3. Three Ways to Deform Something

   Stretch it, squeeze it, shear it. Three moduli, and for an isotropic solid only two of them are independent.

4. 4. The Area Under the Curve

   Why the formula has a half in it, what happens to the energy past yield, and why a bow is not made of steel.

5. 5. Why Bones Are Hollow

   The same material and the same mass, arranged three ways, differ in bending stiffness by more than changing the metal would.