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A Cleaner, Cheaper Route to Titanium
Burlap writes "Using technology developed at MIT, 4-person startup Avanti Metal hopes to reduce the cost of producing Titanium from the current $40 per pound to a mere $3. The article discusses how a special combinations of oxides and electrolysis separates the titanium metal from the Earth's abundant titanium oxide ore."
No one found this earlier. The Hall-Heroult Process for aluminium is basically the same,and has been known for well over a century.
Inventions have long since reached their limit, and I see no hope for further development.-- Frontinus, 1st cent. AD
Titanium foil hats HERE WE COME!
I worked at a titanium manufacturing plant where I analyzed samples for nitrogen contamination. Even though it was a pretty low level repetitive job, I still felt like a scientist working in a lab wearing a lab coat and the head chemist was a guy from Sweden named Jurgen (?sp). I also remember that the titanium tetrachloride was so volatile that just a spoonfull released into the atmosphere would create a huge white cloud and the fire department would show up and management would have to fill out an incident report. Good memories, except for the time I got hydrofluoric acid on my fingers, very painfull, and of course when I accidently breathed in some vapors and had frequent nosebleeds for several years afterwards.
All generalities are dangerous except ones that start with "All
Twice as strong vs 1.6 times as heavy, higher melting point, better resistance to corrosion and fatigue.
rj
Not to be pedantic or anything, but you would actually fare worse in a car wreck in a Titanium car, as it wouldn't give as readily as steel. The more time the impact lasts, the less force the passengers experience. So in a wreck between a titanium Geo Metro and a steel Geo Metro, the passengers of the titanium car could be extracted faster but would be more likely to die. There are more considerations to engineering than just weight and efficiency. If something cant get you from point A to point B as safely as the less-efficient alternative, than the less-efficient alternative bears at least some looking into.
SRSLY.
Several reasons:
1. Insulation; titanium is less condutive of heat/electricity. This can be a benefit or detriment depending on the application.
2. Strength; the same amount of Ti/Al alloys to support a specific load can be made with a lighter weight of Ti. An equal volume of Ti is heavier than Al, though.
3. Fatigue life; titanium, like iron, has infinite fatigue life. Aluminum does not. What this means is you can make a spring from Ti but Al will fail if repeatedly stressed.
4. Corrosion; titanium is more corrosion resistant than Al because it oxidizes rapidly in contact with air
5. Social reasons; titanium has significantly more percieved value than Al, moreso than the material differences. Further Ti has a unique color as well.
Sometimes aluminum will still be better; in many applications the relative strength difference doesn't matter and thus a lighter equivalent volume of Al is advantageous. Also, the high conductivity of Al is a good thing in many situations.
The most common Ti alloy, Ti-6Al-4V, actually has 6% Al in it.
In summary, titanium is kept in limited used in industry because it's hard to weld, not because it's expensive.
Just wanted to add to all of the great stuff you said by also pointing out that titanium is also a pain to work with in pretty much every other way. It's tough to machine, it's also a bitch to use as sheet metal--it's springy and not as malleable as steel or aluminum at room temperature. You've often got to heat it signifigantly if you need to make tight bends... Plus, all of that is compounded by the alloys of titanium which are even harder to use and form than the pure stuff.
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Let's think of this from a business standpoint: patent the process. Produce titanium in small numbers to prevent market saturation. Charge the same amount as everyone else, but at 10% the production cost. I don't see the savings being passed to the consumer anytime soon.
Well the patent holder would want to maximise profit, so will have to produce enough to make it worth while. So, this would increase supply at least somewhat and thus likely decrease prices. And it is very likely that the patent holder would just want to license the process to current companies instead of actually getting capital to start their own plant. So, they would have incentive to license the process to as many companies as possible. At which point it only takes one company to decide that it needs to increase production to increase market share in order to have an effect of lowering prices. Of course, there can always be anti competitive price fixing, but that is illegal and can't go on forever.