What exactly is the difference between titanium steel, pure titanium, and titanium alloys is briefly explained today.
The name titanium steel is not a standard academic name, but a commercial name. Because 316L stainless steel corrosion prevention, acid and alkali resistance is better than general stainless steel, the standard grade 022Cr17Ni12Mo2, mainly contains Cr, Ni, Mo, the number indicates the approximate percentage of content.
It can be seen that titanium steel is titanium-free, and its main component is still iron. This commercial name is used to differentiate it from other stainless steels when used as jewelry and to gain a higher value. It is also true that 316L stainless steel is in fact superior in cost and corrosion resistance to the usual common stainless steels.
And what can really be called titanium is generally two main categories: pure titanium and titanium alloys.
The highest titanium content is just made of titanium sponge, made of titanium tetrachloride by magnesium reduction, it is long like this: loose and porous, very low strength, can not be used directly as titanium, is used as the most upstream material of titanium, after melting, forging, rolling, processing into a variety of shapes of plates, wires, tubes and so on.
The titanium content of titanium sponge is close to 100%. However, titanium is so active that it reacts easily with oxygen, nitrogen and hydrogen in the air when it comes into contact with the air, so complete 100% purity is almost impossible.
Generally speaking, titanium with a content higher than 95% becomes industrially pure titanium. Pure titanium is divided into TA1-TA4 according to its titanium content and impurity content, and we usually see TA1 and TA2. impurities are mainly oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen, carbon, iron, etc. The higher the titanium content, the more pure it is. The higher the titanium content, the softer it is, the lower the strength we talk about, but the better its toughness.
So when we make titanium belt buckles and titanium jewelry, we will use TA1 material in the place where the force is not very strong, while the shaft, tiny screws like this, will use TA2 material.
When we do pure titanium cups, we can not use TA2, the higher the purity the better, especially the hydrogen content must be low, otherwise because the toughness is not enough, it is easy to crack, or appear more obvious, a line of stretching lines, or pockmarks, scrap rate will be quite high.
Then talk about titanium alloy, as the name suggests, is titanium and other metals, non-metals to form alloys. These metals and non-metals such as aluminum, molybdenum, vanadium, chromium, iron, zirconium, tin, oxygen, carbon and so on. Titanium alloys are subdivided into TA, TB and TC series according to their metallographic structure.
Take the most commonly used TC4 titanium alloy as an example, its titanium content is 90%, aluminum 6%, vanadium 4%, so it is also called titanium 6 aluminum 4 vanadium.TC4 titanium alloy is the world's earliest developed and most widely used titanium alloy, and the earliest titanium alloy used for medical treatment, its production accounts for about half of the world's total production of all kinds of titanium alloy products, and in the aerospace industry is more than 80%. It has high corrosion resistance, higher strength than pure titanium, good toughness, processing and welding is relatively easy, so the overall performance is excellent, and also like pure titanium is not cause allergies.
Is pure titanium or titanium alloy better?
This is not conclusive, different materials for different products, in general, excluding factors such as shape, titanium alloy material costs are higher than pure titanium. Of course, the titanium alloy here is to be a regular grade, is based on titanium to join other metals and non-metals, rather than adding a little titanium in other metals, containing a little bit of titanium to pretend to be titanium alloy of that kind.
