Slashdot Mirror
New Technology Produces Cheaper Tantalum and Titanium
Billy the Mountain writes "A small UK company is bringing new technology online that could reduce the prices of tantalum and titanium ten-fold. According to this piece in The Economist: A tantalising prospect, the key is a technique similar to smelting aluminum with a new twist: The metallic oxides are not melted as with aluminum but blended in powder form with a molten salt that serves as a medium and electrolyte. This technology is known as the FFC Cambridge Process. Other metals include Neodymium, Tungsten, and Vanadium."
Slashdot is certainly prone to error, so I'm not going to defend this specific case, but it's not uncommon for a 17 year lapse between having a process progressing from an academic discovery to an industrial implementation. Using your example, it was a decade between the first flight and the first scheduled commercial flight (heck, even four years to the first passenger).
"$30 for the One True Ring. $10 each additional ring!" -- JRR "Bob" Tolkien
one might even say he threw a tantalum
You want to talk hard to work with, try gamma titanium aluminide.
I think gamma titanium aluminide is managing my project.
Seriously, do the people posting these stories ever read TFA?
"The metallic oxides are not *melted as with aluminum* but blended in powder form with a molten salt that serves as a medium and electrolyte."
Wrong! The Hall-Héroult process (main Al production method) is exactly that! Dissolving alumina in molten cryolite to allow electrolysis without heating to alumina's melting point.
So actually the apparent amazing breakthrough turns out to be, "oh hey, they found a new solvent to dissolve things in".
Accurate facts please guys, leave the sensationalising by omission to the tabloids.
Face it, there's probably enough keywords there to have triggered alarm bells at the NSA anyway.
I've only used it for prototypes, but nothing aerospace. Which means either very expensive custom tooling for die casting or machining. And it won't quite machine like metal. Grinding works, but that's slow for complex shapes.
It's not impossible to work with, just weird. Vibrates and makes the strangest sounds while machining.
Now that I think about it, boralyn was worse. Tore up machine tools and gummed up grinding tools. You can cast, forge, and weld the stuff. But none of the parts I work with are amenable to those processes.
The world is made by those who show up for the job.
Is your manager brittle, expensive, and prone to making weird noises?
The world is made by those who show up for the job.
It could literally change the world.
Titanium--which is actually common in the soil--is an amazingly strong metal that is also quite corrosion resistant and can withstand very temperatures. Even with the expensive production processes used up till now, titanium was favored by the aerospace industry because of its strength and heat resistance and for making propeller blades for ship screws because they withstood the corrosive effects of seawater.
With a vastly cheaper production process, it could make it possible to substantially lighten the weight of automobiles--which has the benefit of either lower petrol/diesel fuel consumption or needing a smaller battery pack (in the case of electric cars). And it means high-speed trains can be vastly lighter while still meeting safety standards for passenger train cars, which means smaller and more efficient traction motors on electric multiple unit (EMU) passenger trains.
I once posted elsewhere about what *I* think would be great subjects for video.slashdot.org, behind the scenes at the computer room of a major observatory for example. I think getting a video tour of your shop might be equally fascinating. Exotic boron and/or titantium alloys and it's not an aerospace application? I'm guessing racing bicycles or Formula 1 fabrication work. Either way, I'd love to see an interview where you discuss what it's like working with these unusual materials.
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Titanium is a very good material, but it isn't perfect. The fatigue capability is relatively low for its strength, especially in cast form. Strength at temperature is good, but far short of nickel based superalloys that are similar in cost. Low ductility and elastic modulus means it isn't easily formable and makes machining more difficult. It has limited resistance to wear due to lower hardenability. Oh, and it can catch on fire under the right conditions.
Although, for many aerospace applications there's no substitute at almost any cost. It allows the weight of parts, that would otherwise need to be made of steel or nickel alloys, to be cut nearly in half (and that adds up quickly since it applies to a large portion of the main structural components in things like jet engines).
If the price does drop drastically, I'd expect to start seeing Ti show up a lot more in areas like the automotive industry, where weight is important but it's use had been limited by cost.
Knowledge Brings Fear