The beams deflection is an important subject in physics and engineering courses to study the elastic properties of a great variety of industrial materials . In this work the experimental deflection of thin glass sheets in cantilever is presented. The deflection test is realized putting weights on the free extreme of glass sheets, in order to determine the dependence of elastic properties and breaking point with length and width of the beams. The material is also examined to verified if presents mechanical hysteresis. Finally a comparison between the experimental elastic curve and the calculated whit the small slopes model is performed. This is a very cheap experiment which could be implemented easily in physics or engineering labs to illustrate materials elastic properties.
beams deflection; Young module
