Sandstone
Sandstone is a type of common industrial natural stone. It has the lowest tensile strength and the highest thermal conductivity among natural stone materials. The graph bars on the material properties cards below compare sandstone to other natural stone materials (top) and the entire database (bottom). A full bar means this is the highest value in the relevant set. A half-full bar means it's 50% of the highest, and so on.
Mechanical Properties
Compressive (Crushing) Strength
120 MPa 18 x 103 psi
Elastic (Young's, Tensile) Modulus
38 GPa 5.5 x 106 psi
Poisson's Ratio
0.25
Shear Modulus
15 GPa 2.2 x 106 psi
Tensile Strength: Ultimate (UTS)
4.0 MPa 0.58 x 103 psi
Thermal Properties
Maximum Temperature: Mechanical
400 °C 750 °F
Specific Heat Capacity
880 J/kg-K 0.21 BTU/lb-°F
Thermal Conductivity
5.6 W/m-K 3.2 BTU/h-ft-°F
Thermal Expansion
10 µm/m-K
Other Material Properties
Density
2.6 g/cm3 160 lb/ft3
Dielectric Strength (Breakdown Potential)
8.5 kV/mm 0.33 V/mil
Common Calculations
Stiffness to Weight: Axial
8.1 points
Stiffness to Weight: Bending
43 points
Strength to Weight: Axial
0.43 points
Strength to Weight: Bending
2.1 points
Thermal Diffusivity
2.4 mm2/s
Thermal Shock Resistance
0.75 points
Followup Questions
Further Reading
CRC Materials Science and Engineering Handbook, 4th ed., James F. Shackelford et al. (editors), 2015