Comparison of conventional Knoop and Vickers hardness of ceramic materials

Conventional hardness tests with Knoop and Vickers indenters were performed in order to show how Knoop hardness test can give the same hardness number obtained by Vickers hardness test. This is obtained when Knoop hardness number is calculated based on the residual plastically deformed area whether projected or true. Complementary hardness data obtained from the literature were used in this work in order to validate the method proposed in this work. A revision of the well-known relation of Marshall is proposed in order to determine the elastic modulus by means of one Knoop hardness test when the Vickers hardness is unknown.