A ? is a crack in metal caused by stress and fatigue from repeated pulling or bending.

• A. crack
• B. fracture
• C. gouge
• D. kink

Answer: (B)

When metal is subjected to repeated loading, such as pulling or bending, it experiences fatigue. Small flaws or microcracks start at stress concentrators and grow with every cycle. Over time, these cracks propagate until the remaining section can no longer support the load, causing the material to separate. That final separation is what we call a fracture. So the description fits fracture: it’s the crack that results from stress and fatigue leading to breakage. The other terms don’t match the idea of failure from cyclic loading—gouge is just material removal, kink is a bend, and crack describes the flaw itself but not the eventual break under fatigue.