Materials, Properties and Design

· For a Light / Strong tensile element, material selection is made on the basis of the criteria shown in the diagram.
· For optimum Stiffness, the material is chosen that has the largest value of (E /ρ).
· For optimum Strength (elastic range) the choice is based on (σ_y / ρ ).

After: Ashby and Jones, "Engineering Materials," Pergamon (1980)