Flexural vibration test of a cantilever beam with a force sensor: fast determination of Young's modulus

We describe a simple and very inexpensive undergraduate laboratory experiment for fast determination of Young's modulus at moderate temperatures with the aid of a force sensor. A strip-shaped specimen rigidly bolted to the force sensor forms a clamped - free cantilever beam. Placed in a furnace, it is subjected to free-bending vibrations followed by a fast Fourier transform for identifying the resonant frequency, whereby Young's modulus is calculated from the Euler - Bernoulli beam model. Room temperature moduli obtained for a series of diverse industrial materials (stainless steel, copper, aluminium, Perspex, wood and getinax) are in excellent agreement with the available literature data. The temperature dependence of Young's modulus for stainless steel measured over the 300 - 600 K interval is analysed.