Materials Testing Laboratory

The Materials Testing Laboratory equipment enables students to learn best practices to determine proper material usages in engineering design and industrial applications.

Educational Application

Students in this area perform structured and project-based laboratory activities related to ASTM and AFS materials testing standards, using a variety of equipment to conduct hardness, tensile, compression, impact, and microstructure characterization tests.  Students are provided with heat treating and cooling equipment to perform testing related to various environmental conditions and heat treatments.  This allows for various treatments such as strain and case hardening, enabling students to physically determine how materials are affected.

The laboratory serves:

  • MET 143 (Materials and Processes I)
  • MET 144 (Materials and Processes II)
  • MET 346 (Advanced Materials in Manufacturing)
  • MET 444 (Applied Metallurgy)

Available Equipment

  • 4 LECO LR-310 Rockwell hardness testers, 2 LECO LCB3100 Brinell hardness testers
  • Kingscan optical microscope for Brinell hardness characterization
  • 5 LECO PX300 grinder/polishers, 1 LECO PX400 semi-automatic grinder/polisher
  • 1 LECO MX300 mounting press, 1 LECO VX4 inverted microscope
  • 1 LECO MSX-255M linear sectioning machine
  • 2 Lindberg/Blue BF51442C heat treating furnaces (1200*C)
  • 1 Instron 34TM-50 universal testing system (50/20kN)
  • 1 Tinius-Olsen IT-104 charpy impact tester
  • 1 Jominy end quench testing apparatus
  • 16 student computer workstations with software including: MagmaSoft, Flow-3D, Various CAD packages, Pandat, Vericut
Campus/Location Facility Location Faculty Contact
West Lafayette LMBS B257C Milan Rakita, Gozdem Kilaz, Clayton Kibbey