Knoop hardness

Knoop hardness, a measure of the hardness of a material, calculated by measuring the indentation produced by a diamond tip that is pressed onto the surface of a sample. The test was devised in 1939 by F. Knoop and colleagues at the National Bureau of Standards in the United States. By using lower indentation pressures than the Vickers hardness test, which had been designed for measuring metals, the Knoop test allowed the hardness testing of brittle materials such as glass and ceramics.

The diamond indenter employed in the Knoop test is in the shape of an elongated four-sided pyramid, with the angle between two of the opposite faces being approximately 170° and the angle between the other two being 130°. Pressed into the material under loads that are often less than one kilogram-force, the indenter leaves a four-sided impression about 0.01 to 0.1 mm in size. The length of the impression is approximately seven times the width, and the depth is 1/30 the length. Given such dimensions, the area of the impression under load can be calculated after measuring only the length of the longest side with the aid of a calibrated microscope. The final Knoop hardness (HK) is derived from the following formula:

HK = 14.229(F/D²),

with F being the applied load (measured in kilograms-force) and D² the area of the indentation (measured in square millimetres). Knoop hardness numbers are often cited in conjunction with specific load values.