Tensile

What Does Tensile Mean?

Tensile refers to a type of external physical force applied to a material in a pulling direction away from its surface. Tensile typically refers to tensile strength or tensile stress.

Corrosionpedia Explains Tensile

Tensile strength refers to the degree to which a material can withstand a perpendicularly applied pull force. The applied force is called tensile stress. At the maximum amount of tensile stress applied, a material will undergo failure in the form of breaking, fracturing and permanent deformation.

There are three types of tensile strength:

• Ultimate strength: The measure of stress a material can withstand in total.
• Yield strength: The measure of stress a material can withstand without permanent deformation
• Breaking strength: The measure of stress coordinate on the stress-strain curve at the point of rupture where the material undergoes fracturing.