Work Hardening

Strength and hardness of a metal increases as a result of plastic deformation. This process is called work hardening.

Increases:

• strength
• hardness

Decreases:

• ductility
• toughness

Steps

• Specimen is loaded onto a tensile test apparatus
• Test is stopped after the specimen has plastically deformed and haven’t reached UTS
• Specimen is unloaded and reloaded
• New $\sigma-\epsilon$ diagram will have an increased yield strength