TAS-2010-0007.R4 1 Accepted version. I. MECHANICAL METHOD FOR EXPERIMENTAL DETERMINATION OF THE FIRST-PENETRATION FIELD IN HIGH- TEMPERATURE SUPERCONDUCTORS IEEE Transactions on Applied Superconductivity IEEE owns Copyright of the final version DOI: 10.1109/TASC.2012.2208267 Manuscript received May 12, 2012. This work has been supported by the Comunidad de Madrid under project CCG08-UC3M/ENE-4505 E. Díez-Jiménez is with the Departamento de Ingeniería Mecánica. Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Butarque, 15. E28911 Leganés. Spain. (e- mail: ediez@ ing.uc3m.es). J.L. Pérez-Díaz. is with the Instituto Pedro Juan de Lastanosa Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Butarque, 15. E28911 Leganés. Spain (phone: +34 616689298; e-mail: jlperez@ing.uc3m.es). J. C. García-Prada is with the Departamento de Ingeniería Mecánica. Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Butarque, 15. E28911 Leganés. Spain. (e- mail: jcgprada@ ing.uc3m.es).