Apparatus for Measuring Crush Strength of Microspheres

An apparatus was designed and built which can measure the force required to crush a single particle 0.1 to 0.38 mm in diameter. The sensing element consists of two strain gauges attached to a strain bar. The force applied to a particle placed at one end of the strain bar is detected by the strain gauge, and the resulting signal is amplified and recorded on a 1‐mV recorder. The instrument was standardized using weights from the National Bureau of Standards, and is used to measure crush strengths between 0.5 and 500 g.