Titanium Jigs for Anodizing & Plating industries.

Any item to be anodized requires reliable jigging. First to stop the components falling to the bottom of the anodizing tank and secondly so that the electrical current can safely pass from the jig to the work pieces. Anodizing jigs are usually made from Aluminum or Titanium. Aluminum jigs get anodized of course and have to be chemically stripped, the constant anodizing and stripping results in a short life and hence the use of Titanium which does not require stripping after the anodizing process.

Titanium is far less conductive than Aluminum so that jig design, always very important, is critical. Contact points and therefore jig marks need to be larger than with Aluminum jigs to avoid contact burns during processing.

Many jigs rely on small sprung fingers gripping the work piece in some way; with hard anodising the favoured way with large pieces especially is to use titanium screws to get a positive reliable contact. It should be remembered that holding work in the process will result in small un-anodised areas and it is unrealistic to expect 100% coating. Jigging can usually be arranged to avoid sensitive areas. This should be borne in mind when designing for corrosion resistance and wear resistance in particular.

Titan Engineering Pte Ltd specialises in supplying complete jigs or titanium materials for making jigs. Our jig materials are custom made order for springiness required in hold the parts

.

The Big Head Ache - Corrosion

Metal is notorious for corroding in water applications.  The power packed combination of moisture, oxygen and salt, especially sodium chloride, is more deadly to metal than rust.  It corrodes or eats away at the metal by weakening it and eventually causing it to fall apart.  And if the metal is submerged in a salt water environment than count on your metal corroding five times faster than if it was in fresh water.

Considering we rely on metal in just about every "water-related" application out there, the above statistics sound a bit bleak.  Let's see, we need metal in plumbing, water filtration, sewage plants, hydro-electric power, oil & gas platform parts in the ocean, engine cooling, refrigeration, irrigation and the list goes on and on.  How could the world's economy and infrastructure have survived if metal wasn't used in water applications?  Well, since you and I haven't heard about the world's ongoing struggle to find a metal for water applications that means a solution must have been found.  

Traditionally, steel is not seen as a suitable metal for water applications.  Why?  Remember that moisture is highly corrosive to most metals including steel and zinc. In order to make steel suitable for water applications, there is a process called Hot Dip Galvanizing.  This is where a "layer or protective suit" is metallurgically bonded to the steel.  This bonded layer is a complete, uniform coating that adds strength (approx. 3600 psi) and long term durability to the part. 

However before you go and select Hot Dip Galvanizing Steel (HDGS) as your "go to water metal", beware of some of the disadvantages.  You must know what type of water the part will be submerged in, such as; pure water (distilled or de-ionized water), fresh water, or seawater. Each water environment has different mechanisms that determine the ultimate corrosion rate.  For instance, studies show that HDGS will corrode up to ten times faster in a pure water environment than in a fresh water environment. 

Also, one of the most corrosive areas for HDGS is in Agitated Waters, such as; wash zones and tide lines.  The agitation accelerates the corrosion rate of the zinc.  Often the “washing” motion removes the passive scales which are forming on the surfaces, exposing fresh zinc which tries to redevelop more scales/patina. This leads to rapid erosion of the zinc coating resulting in increased corrosion rates.

So what are the alternatives? 

TITANIUM.

It is amazing how titanium stands out against the "big guys", like Steel and Stainless Steel in certain environments and applications. Even though annual titanium consumption accounts for such a small percentage of all the metal consumed in the world - it is clear that titanium has a major part to play in the Metals Industry.  I am finding that it is a unique, diverse and adaptable underdog.  

I hope you enjoyed the blog and if you have any questions at all please feel free to contact us at sales @ titanium.com.sg or call (+65) 6853 7424 or visit us at www.titanium.com.sg

Until next time...enjoy your week!

Why Titanium metal turns blue after wire-cut process?

At Titan Engineering - Singapore, we do a fair amount of titanium metal plates by wire-cut machine and the appearance is important to all our customers. It is usual that the surface will become blue in color after wire-cut machining. The bluing does not go very deep into the material and can be mostly removed by polishing with a scrub pad. Polishing does cause the recast layer to go a little deeper but not deep enough to affect the material.

Wire-cut bluing of titanium is often mistaken for thermal damage, but the coloration you sometimes see at the edges of a wire-cut titanium surface is actually nothing but anodic oxidation created by the field of electrical current around the wire electrode during wire cutting. This ionized field produces a thin, and transparent oxide film on the top and bottom surfaces adjacent to the wire path. This oxide can be in the atomic range to several hundred nano meters thick. The colors produced in this manner have no pigments, dies or chemicals in them and are known as interference colors.

Interference colors are created when light strikes an oxidized surface. Part of the light is reflected and part of it passes through the oxide film to be reflected off the metal surface beneath it. As the light bounces back and passes through the oxide layer, it is slowed or interfered with, hence its name. This interference creates a color similar to the way a prism bends white light and breaks it into colors depending upon the angle. Every color in the rainbow can be achieved by this effect with the thickness of the oxide film (amount of interference) determining the color. Like anodizing, voltages, current density, water chemistry and pH can all affect the colors produced. The visible oxide colors that WEDM current typically generates are mostly in the blue and red spectrums, being a definite blue along the wire path and often fading to a tinge of red on the outer edges of the discoloration.

Being aware of all this may sound rather obscure, but we actually had to learn about this out of necessity. In a galaxy far, far away, in another lifetime when we had our shop (pre-AC generators and AE technology), we had to explain what the bluing was to many a freaked-out know all aerospace engineer, who upon seeing a WEDM'ed titanium part for the first time, would mistakenly think we had somehow "thermally damaged" the cut surfaces of his part to a depth of 2mm and it was now expensive scrap and started to jump up and down. <-- Engineer's reaction, Seriously.

This may sound amusing today, but if we weren't able to explain bluing to the at-that time to those EDM-paranoid engineers, we would have never received another titanium job from any of them. After this incident, we quickly learned to buff the top and bottom surfaces a bit to camouflage the bluing and eliminate any frantic questions or arguing for another titanium job. 

As a side note, this color proves that your material is real titanium, as no other material turns blue after wire-cut. Happy Wire-cutting Titanium, with blue. :)

Titanium Metal & Alloy Supplier - Singapore

Titanium Metal Supplier - Singapore

Titan Engineering Pte Ltd is a Singapore based Stockiest & Distributors of Titanium metal & alloy materials to the various industries like aerospace, marine, Oil & Gas, chemical processing factories and Precision Engineering Companies. 

Complete packages of titanium pipes, flanges/forgings, plates, bars and fittings are supplied to the fabrication companies, contractors and engineering companies as well as direct supply to the major Oil & Gas industries. Titan has an extensive stock range of titanium metal plates, rods, sheets, strips and welding rods in CP grades as well as in Ti6Al4V grades. Our supply range includes Nickel, Inconel, Monel, Incoloy, extruded aluminum fin-tubes, heat exchanger tubes and MMO coated titanium anodes. 

As one of the largest titanium material distributors in Singapore, Titan Engineering is a global supplier of titanium mill products, stocking a complete range of prime titanium round bars, plates, sheets, billets, and various additional shapes to suit your requirements. Industries that we commonly serve include aerospace, oil and gas, medical, defense, chemical, automotive, precision engineering, tooling, marine, and recreational industries. 

Our Range of Products are: 

Titanium- Commercially pure(CP) grades 
Titanium Ti6AL4V & ELI grades 
Titanium Bars/ Rods 
Titanium Sheets, foils 
Titanium Pipes, tubes & fittings 
Titanium Wires & welding rods 
Titanium Fasteners 
Heat Exchanger Tubes 
Fin Tubes for process equipments 
Anodes for cathodic protection applications, 
Mixed Metal Oxide(MMO) coated Titanium Anodes, 
Platinum Coated Titanium Anodes 
Speciality Noble metals. 
Nickel Alloys Like Inconel® & Monel® 
Inconel Fasteners. 

Titan Engineering has developed significant alliances and strategic partnerships with major independent processors. This enables us to supply large "mill quantity" orders, without the long mill lead times. 

Our knowledgeable sales force is available to answer any questions you may have and will continuously support you through the entire purchasing process. We are committed to providing the best customer care in the titanium industry and exceeding your expectations on every level 

Titan works together with renowned manufacturers worldwide who specialize in these materials. The company supplies through its extensive stocks material or for larger quantities and longer deliveries, through major titanium and nickel manufacturers. 

We warmly welcome the opportunity of quoting on your needs, whether your requirement is large or small. 

Best Regards! 

Titan Engineering Pte Ltd
Blk 20 Woodlands Link #08-36
Woodlands East Industrial Estate
Singapore 738733
Ph: (65)6853 7424 Fax: (65)685 34970
Email: sales@titanium.com.sg
Web: www.titanium.com.sg