Study on the Mechanical Properties of Sapphire by Numerical Simulation and Nanoindentation Technology
This paper presents a finite element (FE) modeling of the nanoindentation test of sapphire, in which the finite element method was employed to study the mechanical characteristic of sapphire under the nanoindentation process. The results demonstrated that the nanoindentation FE models were able to simulate the indentation loading-unloading curves of the sapphire. The load and unload displacement curves of the simulation and experiment results can match with each other well, and then the properties used in the simulation should be the actual properties of the sapphire. The Mises stress field distribution of the sapphire sample was calculated to reveal the alteration from elastic region to plastic region, which are useful for indentifying the ductile to brittle change in the sapphire abrasive process.