The Sexiest Metal

jonerik writes "Denver's weekly Westword magazine has this article on titanium and the attempts to break it out of its traditional aerospace/defense industry niche, including its growing use in architecture, computers, jewelry, sports, knives, cars, medicine, and other areas. The upside: It's as strong as steel but weighs half as much, it doesn't rust, and it's fairly plentiful. The downside: It's expensive compared to steel and aluminum and its high melting point makes it difficult to work with under some conditions. Still, it's nice to see it being used in other applications." Heck, I know someone who used it as his wedding ring. Pretty cool, actually.

Titanium is also very flexible.

[Flarners]

Titanium may be as strong as steel, but it's far easier to bend when cut thin. Anybody who has one of the titanium PowerBooks will attest to the fact that if you try to pick them up from one end, the thing will bend disturbingly. This is why you won't see titanium in kitchen sinks, silverware or anywhere else where the metal needs to be thin, strong, and unflexible. The only thing it has going over steel in these cases is buzzword compliance and price (if it's more expensive, it must be better!)

Sexier

[Beliskner]

A sexier metal is Selenium. Runner up is Elerium-115 [abovetopsecret.com]

Titanium wedding rings

[totallygeek]

Be careful about using titanium for your wedding rings (or any ring for that matter). The ring cannot be resized, and is fairly-much useless if your finger grows or shrinks.

Re:Ti Wedding Ring?

[Tekmage]

Just a followup to this. If/when you get a Ti ring, get in the habit of taking it off at night so it doesn't get stuck.

My wife got my a Ti-Au combo ring for X-mas; I wear it on my right middle-finger. :-)

Re:Ti Wedding Ring?

[ek_adam]

With titanium, I don't think you'd have such an easy time removing a stuck ring. A cutting torch is not going to leave much of a finger and using a diamond saw, too, could be real tricky with in vivo parts involved.

Forget power tools, just be patient with a small hand file.

Re:Titanium is also very flexible.

[Zeio]

Uncoated and unalloyed metals are of limited use in general. A pure gold ring will fold quite easily if pressed between your fingers. It must be alloyed with Copper to make it reasonable.

I find that people who don't use alloyed titanium and instead use pure or cheap alloys annoying, because sex appeal is not very important in a functional unit.

As far as interesting metals go, Platinum and Iridium are far more interesting and "sexy". Iridium makes radiant salt and complexes, and both of these metals are very "noble," resisting tarnish. I would think a titanium ring for a wedding band as a trite piece of junk personally.

I have personally seen a forged iridium platinum ring. It was striking. Far better than gold, I think.

There is also an alloy of steel and gold, gold steel, which is a very curious blue color.
[tms.org]
Alloys are an awesome field, I recently read an article about Damascus steel, and that it has *finally* been recreated.

I think that the statement that Titanium is the sexiest metal is the furthest thing from the truth - its interesting, its useful, but not sexy. Unless the Russians have recently began to set the sex appeal standard in the world ;p.

Note that the Alfa class subs the Russians use are able to go several times deeper than a Seawolf class. The Alfas are made from titanium and can go over 4,000 feet deep.

I have provided a link FAS, which shows the real world implications of Titanium and Steel strength. This is also manifested in that fact that because the Russians have a plethora of Titanium, they are able to make cobra-maneuver capable jets like the MiG-29 and Su-27, Su-37, Su-everything, . Titanium is not for sex appeal, its for strength when alloyed with the right things. Even though the Russian planes are more acrobatically capable, Avionics, JSTARS, and AWACS makes the dog fighting concept almost entirely obsolete in modern warfare.

[fas.org]
A submarine's hull is normally constructed of steel, or exceptionally of titanium. Special High Yield [HY] steel alloys have been developed to increase the diving depth of submarines, although the improved depth performance of these alloys imposes a price of increased fabrication challenges. These special steels are denominated by their yield stress in thousands of pounds per square inch -- thus HY-80 steel has a yield stress of 80,000 pounds per square inch [corresponding to a depth of 1,800 feet], HY-100 a a yield stress of 100,000 pounds per square inch [corresponding to a depth of 2,250 feet], and so on.

During World War II, American fleet submarines normally operated at a depth of 200 feet, though in emergencies they would dive to a depth of 400 feet.
Post-War American submarines, both conventional and nuclear, had improved designs and were constructed of improved materials [the equivalent of "HY-42"]. These boats had normal operating depths of some 700 feet, and a crush depth of 1100 feet.
The Thresher, the first American submarine constructed of HY-80 steel, reportedly had a normal operating depth of 1,300 feet, roughly two-thirds the crush depth limit imposed by the HY-80 steel.
The Seawolf, the first American submarine constructed of HY-100 steel, is officially claimed by the Navy to have a normal operating depth of "greater than 800 feet," but based on the reported operating depth of the Thresher, it may be assumed that the normally operating depth of the Seawolf is roughly double the official figure.
The Soviet Alfa submarines, constructed of titanium, reportedly had an operating depth of nearly 4,000 feet
.

Baxter.