Stress and strain of all three kinds, Hooke's law and the named points on the stress–strain curve, Young's, bulk and shear moduli, Poisson's ratio, energy density and elastic hysteresis.
Unit 1 carries 10 of the 50 physics marks; with eight chapters sharing them, this one averages a little over one (MEC publishes weights by unit, not by chapter). Elasticity is the shortest chapter in the unit and the most mechanical: one definition, three moduli, one graph and one energy formula carry almost every question that can be set, so it is worth finishing completely rather than half-learning.
The MEC scope line runs: Stress, strain, moduli of elasticity, Poisson's ratio and energy density. The single heading below is that point, and the subsections take its five items in order.
Three ways it comes. Recall: the unit of stress, which modulus a liquid has and which it does not, the range of Poisson's ratio, the name of the point beyond which a wire will not come back. Understanding: why steel is more elastic than rubber although rubber stretches further, why the breaking stress of a wire does not depend on its length, what the area under a stress–strain curve measures, what a hysteresis loop costs. Application: the extension of a loaded wire, the energy stored in it, the fractional compression of water under pressure, two wires joined end to end.
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