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IndustryArena Forum > Community Club House > International / Regional Forums > Australia, New Zealand Club House > Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand
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  1. #1
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    Oct 2019
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    Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Hi all, I am new to the forum and am wanting to connect with anyone who machines Titanium particularly grade 5. I am part of a venture that is trying to make access to grade 5 Ti more readily available and cost affective. I believe that titanium available this way will pave a new segment in the market place. Would anyone be interested in purchasing this type of titanium product?

  2. #2
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    Jul 2018
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    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Hi Pete - To make Ti more available you need to have a readily available source. Most machinists can machine it if you give them a chunk of the stuff. Grade 5 is Ti6-4 or a common structural grade. If you have availability of std tube sizes at a good price then engineers and designers like myself can specify it. Unfortunately especially in Oz getting Ti6-4 or Ti3-2 is an issue. Ti will see more use but through 3D printing so you need to get into that. Machining parts will become less and less used but finishing parts by machining will increase. I used to get Ti and magnesium through a supplier in california many years ago for bicycle, yacht and race car parts. Now most of these parts are made in Carbon Fibre. Much easier to make something in CF then in Ti but there are still things that need machining. So tell us where to get the stuff and what you will have available? Its a large $$$ commitment to have local (Oz) stocking of a range of material, that's the usual commercial problem. Cheers Peter S

  3. #3
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    Oct 2019
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    Thanks Peteeng, really appreciate your response. I know it's probably a difficult to specify but are there any particular sizes or shapes (standard tubes) that are most common? We will be able to forge round and square bar in a few sizes but need to start with the most common sizes at first.

  4. #4
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    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Hi Pete - Look up any Ti tube supplier in the US and see what they stock. You have a forge? Hot or warm? The only opportunity I can think of is car wheels. Can you forge those? They would be high performance, lighter than aluminium as its specific strength and fatigue properties are better then Al and you can heat treat it to purple or anodise it very bright colours. Wouldn't be as light as CF but you could make then faster so they would be cheaper. Peter

  5. #5
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    Jun 2010
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    4252

    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    I machine a lot of Titanium, including both CP and 6Al4V.

    But I must point out that there are already suppliers around, both in America and China, who can supply useful offcuts and 'bits' at a good price. Plenty of volume suppliers on the web and in ebay too.

    You will need a catalog, ex stock availability and price list FIRST. You will also need to specify the cost of freight from China(?) up front. Do not expect anyone to suddenly want to buy 20 kg of Ti from you with zero track record. That just ain't gunna happen today.

    You will also have to accept Paypal: wire transfers won't happen today either.

    Cheers
    Roger

  6. #6
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    Oct 2019
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    Thanks Roger for the reply. The goods will be available in Australia so both the copy and the postage will be predictable with Australia post. Based on what you said in relation to uptake would a test sample offering be a good start for developing some trust in the quality? Paypal and only secure methods of payment excepted and everything will have certification for chemical composition.

  7. #7
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    Thanks Peter, most of the processing including forging will be done offshore but we will receive the processed round bars and other forms and we can cut to specifications here in Australia. From your advice I am seeing a majority of round bar from 5mm -35mm being popular but not sure about square bar and smaller tha 5mm diameters in the round bar.

  8. #8
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    Sep 2006
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    6463

    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    On the subject of Titanium...…...for a DIY purpose...…..can it be melted in a furnace DIY style....that is an electric furnace without flammable scenarios or exotic atmosphere requirements.....the purpose of which to enable offcuts and swarf to be repurposed into more applicable sections or castings?

    What is the tensile strength of Titanium....can it be welded with Tig…..and Argon?

    Hmmmm….I should have first gone on Wicki and genned up on Titanium, lots of info on there...…..definitely not for the average metal worker....too exotic etc.

    In place of that I would go to aluminium bronze for pure strength and machineability properties...…..and you can cast it with ease like aluminium or bronze itself without having to have an inert atmosphere etc......ally/bronze melts fairly low too and the swarf is recyclable.

    The fact that Titanium is so resistant to corrosion makes it a desirable metal to really think about.

    The anticorrosion part is interesting as you could make a hydrogen oxygen generator cell instead of using stainless steel and they sell it on EBAY in .25mm thick foil by the metre......imagine a car body made from that stuff.
    Ian.

  9. #9
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    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    On the subject of Titanium...…...for a DIY purpose...…..can it be melted in a furnace DIY style
    In principle, yes, but it would have to be a very special furnace! The melting point is very high, well beyond what a propane flame in air can achieve. Way out of sight of a resistance-element electric furnace too.
    If you are not careful, molten Ti could catch alight - it burns a bit like magnesium: very hot, fast and very bright. This applies especially to turnings. (How do I know ... ? )

    Ti can certainly be welded: you can even buy Ti welding wire on ebay. I have seen 1.0 mm, 1.6, 2.4 and 3.2 mm. I think you would need to use TIG, but I am not sure what gas mix would be needed. Absolutely you would need to exclude oxygen.

    You can IN THEORY spot weld Ti, but too often it turns out to be a mechanical mishmash rather than a genuine weld. I have tried.

    Cheers
    Roger

  10. #10
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    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Hi HW and all out there- Titanium alloys melts at about 1200C (pure Ti about 1600C) and at that temp it absorbs oxygen readily and turns to titanium dioxide. If you weld it you have to do it in vacuum or have argon both sides. If you do it like aluminium Ar one side then the other side turns to a white powder and the parent metal is rendered useless. It starts to absorb O2 at about 600C which is just under cherry red heat. So you need inert ovens or vacuum ovens to do any sort of hot working of the material. This is similar to alloy steel and hydrogen embrittlement...

    Ti's are very strong if alloyed for structural purposes. The Ti6-4 alloy for instance in normalised condition has a yeild strength of about 900MPa from memory. They can be heat treated via quenching and tempering like steel to very high strengths in vacuum or inert gas ovens etc. Entire cars, boats and planes have been made from Ti. The blackbird supersonic spy plane being a famous one. I used to make Ti6-4 bicycle frames and it's lovely to work with once you get the right gear. But these days you can make lighter things in carbon fibre so Ti is reserved for things that need to be very strong in hot places like engines and exhausts. Its now a very popular 3D printed material because when laser sintered it does not ignite like aluminium does!! Its also bio compatible so many implants are made froth stuff.

    Titanium itself is not corrosion resistant. Its oxide layer (like stainless steel and aluminium ) is very corrosion resistant. Prior to welding I used to clean Ti things in hydrofluoric acid a very nasty one especially when I have a 250 litre tank of the stuff!! Cheers Peter S

  11. #11
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    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Hi Peter

    Sorry, but Ti 6Al4V has a melting point up around 1900 C, not 1200 C.
    EDIT Later: quoting from bad source: 1600 C is approx.

    I have been using a similar alloy in tube form for a vortex burner. The top edge glows quite red hot when in use. Despite regular use, no sign of oxidation yet, although the flame on the inside of the tube may well be slightly reducing. The outside surface remains fine however.
    Click image for larger version. 

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    Incidentally, for Ian: this is a propane flame.

    Cheers
    Roger

  12. #12
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    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Hmm I shouldn't run with memory too far... Ti6-4 data sheet says 1600-1650 so we'll meet in the middle

    ASM Material Data Sheet

    I'm sure your burner is oxidised just can't see it. Like Stainless and aluminium the oxides are nearly transparent. You can heat it and get the blues and yellows, golds like the stainless steel welding rings. Some motorbike exhausts in Ti are heated to a specific temp to turn them bright blue. Cheers Peter

  13. #13
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    Hey guys, done I bit of research as part of this new venture I am co-founding and titanium and it's alloys has high affinities for Oxygen, carbon, hydrogen and nitrogen. The quality of the melt (chemical composition) and grade of titanium is heavily dependent on these falling within certain ranges. Melting always needs to be done in a vacuum as too much oxygen causes embrittlement of the Ti and it looses its advantages, hence the expense of the alloy over steel and Aluminium. It can be welded under argon stream or helium at the site but discolouration on weld site shows oxidisation at site and usually the more different colours to its original the poorer the weld. Melting points are high as stated, heat treatments through aging usually done at 400-500c starts getting reactive at 700-800c boils at 3200c

  14. #14
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    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Can you post the mechanical properties of your material? We'd also need to see the stress-strain curve/relation at various temperatures.
    If you plan on offering a processed mat, you need to offer/sell it to the engineers, not the machinists.
    Hope this helps

  15. #15
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    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Hi Peter

    Yeah, 1600-1650 is right. I thought my figure of 1900 was a bit high, but that is what the web site Material Science | News | Materials Engineering | News claims. I can only conclude they got it wrong. I should have checked.

    The surface of the burner is of course oxidised: all Ti surfaces are. But the oxide film seems to be thin and stable. The splash plate in the middle gets especially hot, but it too shows no signs of damage.
    Attachment 429618
    Incidentally, for Ian: this is a propane flame.

    Cheers
    Roger

  16. #16
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    Aug 2019
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    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Your mat grade's market are engineers, not machinists. I'd compile the set of mechanical/thermal properties and stress-strain curves at various temperatures for the process(es) you utilize and promote your venture as an engineering mat/grade.
    Not that machinists aren't your end buyers, some may will (i.e. random assemblies,cool name for the mat/grade, etc), however your niche seems to target the engineering depts more than anyone else.
    Hope this helps, g'luck

  17. #17
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    6463

    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Hi, thank you all for the detailed info...….I think TI is one of those too hard basket cases where stainless steel can do a similar job......and stainless doesn't catch fire if you nudge it a bit too far.

    I can't really think of a use for Ti specifically, but I see on EBAY there is some Ti foil..... couple a thou thick or so...... selling in 100mm wide rolls a metre long..... a few bucks etc.

    Now that would be interesting for cladding something by gluing the strips on in panel form like tiles......mainly for appearance sake...….and totally impervious to weathering.

    This could be the gold plated solution where you don't have to actually lose an arm and a leg for gold...….hmmmmmm….I think I got that wrong somewhere as I just read it had a silvery lustrous finish and the Ti nitride had the gold finish like they do for insert tooling...…...oh well, silvery cutlery I suppose......stainless is still more user friendly in the end.

    I would think the most useful application would be the top heat range attribute...…..that has a definite usefulness...…..something like a crucible for melting aluminium as ally doesn't need to go so high and won't alloy with Ti like ally would with steel or stainless.

    I think a crucible made from .25mm thick foil would still be in there for ally melting as the heat transfer would be quite good that thin.....just thinking.

    Another think, and I would guess that if you polished Ti foil to a bright finish it would make a good parabolic solar reflector without the finish deteriorating with weathering, however I'm not sure the surface finish would still be bright enough to be a mirror once it oxidised and acquired a Ti nitride coating.....stainless don't do dat mon, and you can buy mirror polished stainless foil in 100mm square tiles for domestic use....very cheaply too....Amazon, Banggood or EBAY I think, it's on my watch list.
    Ian.

  18. #18
    Join Date
    Aug 2014
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    232

    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    I make tuning pins for harps from Ti G5. It turns OK with sharp tooling and plenty of coolant if well supported, although when a tool blunts it all goes south very quickly, it's much lighter than stainless steel, anodizes really easily, and when in place doesn't corrode from the tannins in the wood. I tried it in carbon fibre and galvanic corrosion wasn't a problem in plain water - I haven't tried it in seawater yet.

    3m x 8mm G5 rods cost me £37 each in the UK. ( that's centreless ground for use in sliding head lathe ). Qty would be cheaper, but not everyone wants a harp.

    I wouldn't want to turn it in a conventional lathe though, it has a nasty habit of bending away from the tool if not supported really well.

  19. #19
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    Aug 2014
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    232

    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Quote Originally Posted by handlewanker View Post
    I think a crucible made from .25mm thick foil would still be in there for ally melting as the heat transfer would be quite good that thin.....just thinking.
    It's a poor conductor of heat, which is why tooling melts in seconds if the coolant isn't adequate.

  20. #20
    Join Date
    Jan 2005
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    15362

    Re: Calling all Titanium grade 5 machinists in Australia and New Zealand

    Here is a Good Video on Bike frame manufacturing Etc. and there are many more videos on Titanium use, it is extensively used in the medical industry

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXXJl63Guqg
    Mactec54

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