Comparison and Analysis of Steel and Tungsten Carbide Rockwell B Hardness Ball Indenters Utilizing a General Purpose Finite Element Approach

This paper considers the comparison and evaluation of Rockwell B (HRB) hardness tests using the steel and tungsten carbide ball indenters. There are differences observed in Rockwell B hardness scale tests when using 1.588 mm diameter steel and tungsten carbide indenters. The modeling was made with HRB hardness reference blocks and widespread soft materials. During the simulation it was determined that the tungsten carbide indenter balls had an advantage of being less likely to flatten due to the repeated use, and the use of hard metal indenters might have different measurement results than tests using steel indenters. For further analysis of the results of comparisons it is interesting to conduct researches for Superficial Rockwell scales with the study of very soft materials and the use of spherical indenters with the larger sizes. The obtained results are important for evaluation of the results of international comparisons of the national standards.