What Is Mechanical Weathering?

Weathering is the breaking down of rock by many natural agents like water, wind, and gravity. Mechanical Weathering is when rocks are broken down without a chemical change. They are changing their physical properties. Mechanical weathering can split rocks in half and turn them into dust! Some examples of Mechanical Weathering are ice wedging (when water freezes into ice in cracks of rock and expands the rock cracks) and salt weathering (rock is forced apart by the formation of salt crystals).