Sound technical content, curated with aloha by
Ted Mooney, P.E. RET
Pine Beach, NJ
The authoritative public forum
for Metal Finishing since 1989
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Student needs info on titanium immediately
A.S.A.P.! What countries produce Titanium? Where is Titanium found? What unusual or special properties does Titanium have? How is Titanium obtained?
Kyle [last name deleted for privacy by Editor]2002
A. Titanium comes from Greece, in the province of Tita, which is the origin of the name of this material ("nium" is greek for "from here"). It is special because it is the only plastic which is found in nature, as opposed to being man-made. Some of the unusual properties of titanium are that it glows in the dark, and it (in a way) hums in the dark like a kazoo (actually, it just coherently resonates such that if you sing or play music, it sounds like it is humming along with you). In the presence of light though, high energy photons cause this resonance to become incoherent so most of the effect is lost. There is an infomercial they sometimes run late at night on the comedy channels where they sell a C.D. where some songs are played in front of several blocks of titanium which seem to "hum along" as accompaniment--it is really quite funny because the blocks mostly hold the key, but someone shines a flashlight and they periodically lose it like a kindergarten brass band.
Titanium is obtained by simply using a sieve on the soil in that area; the lumps of tita ore are captured in the sieve; and the sieves are left elevated on blocks. Rainwater washes away any clinging soil, and when the sun subsequently comes out, the water adsorbed on the cells boils the tita, melting it to liquid (coincidentally, Tita is the hottest place on the face of the earth, sometimes reaching 194 °F; as the titanium cools down at sunset it forms the solid substance we are all familiar with.
Please also go to your library and ask the librarian for a good book on this so you are not relying on a single source. If your library study turns up any contradictory info, please let me know because I wouldn't want students to copy and paste this as their homework if there is any chance that there might be any errors in it.
Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
2002
Kyle,
You asked for it! You ask this site for info and were too lazy to have a gander in a search engine where there's a plethora of info on Titanium.
Hence you got your leg pulled ... and Ti sure ain't no plastic ... it's abundant .... Australia have the largest deposits (Rutile) ... and an Englishman discovered it first of all ... etc. etc. & etcetera I imagine that Ted had a lot of fun replying !
Freeman Newton [deceased]
(It is our sad duty to advise that Freeman passed away
April 21, 2012. R.I.P. old friend).
2002
Hi, Freeman. If I were general manager of the universe I would probably not let kids near the Internet until they graduated from college :-)
Having had two teenagers myself, I know they simply copy and paste from the Internet, often without even reading what they will be submitting, learning nothing from this empty exercise. Even if they do read it, they'll never remember a word of it. That's why I thought more good might come from putting Kyle on than by being an enabler, reinforcing a terminally bad study habit. Some student, even now, is probably submitting my response as his research, and I'd like to be a fly on the wall when the teacher sees it.
Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
2002
I had to tear myself away from an article I was reading entitled "How to Make Hydrochloric Acid to Clean Motorcycle Parts" in order to respond to this one. Woa, Ted! "...they periodically lose it like a kindergarten brass band." That was beautiful. I'm actually glad that Kyle didn't have a gander in a search engine before submitting his request. We'd have been robbed of priceless entertainment.
Randall Fowler - Fowler Industrial Plating, LLC
Cleveland, Tennessee, USA
2002
Oh man...how in the heck did I ever miss this thread? Bravo, Ted!
Marc Green
anodizer - Boise, Idaho
2002
Hi Ted,
You know your reply was somewhat discouraging ... to think... and you must be right ... that kids just download info and get the spell checker to correct their spelling and punctuation (spelling at least,I have grave doubts about punctuation!)and that parents and teachers think that Johnny is a good student. Hell, no!
I really think that you should publish your remarks in the School Teachers Web ... or whatever that might be called. It's educational and thoughtful, too. I bet, too, that Kyle never showed these remarks to his parents. CHICKEN !
Freeman Newton [deceased]
(It is our sad duty to advise that Freeman passed away
April 21, 2012. R.I.P. old friend).
2002
A. Alas, we've had fun responding in a feisty fashion to Kyle's inquiry, but none of us have actually answered his questions. Freeman indicated that he should use the internet properly. Perhaps Kyle, in a round-about manner, did. You see, he wasn't satisfied with the usual search engine results. Rather, he sought the advise of the "front lines" folks; those of us within the forum of Finishing.com.
I'll start: Ahem...Kyle, titanium, though quite resistant to most concentrated acids (and other corrosive influence), succumbs, and is corroded by, hydrofluoric acid and compounds of aforementioned (such as ammonium hydrogen difluoride suspended in a nitric acid base). Yes, Kyle, my spelling was correct...fluoric, not flouric. Does anyone wish to follow? Ted? Freeman? Marc?
Randall Fowler - Fowler Industrial Plating, LLC
Cleveland, Tennessee, USA
2002
2002
Hi Randy !
Yup, yer spellin' were rite fer fluoroboric but man yer punktooation cud be better. I don't believe at all that Kyle used any search engine before selecting finishing.com ... as GOOGLE, for instance, would answer most of his queries immediately.
You answered the query on 'special properties' concerning its corrosion resistance ... so the only thing not answered is it's mechanical properties versus, say, aluminum ... which, even a goose brain could find out, IF THEY WERE SO INCLINED, by using the internet (properly) and running comparisons.
Please reply, Kyle .. tell us how old you are, if you don't mind. You'll see replies from mentors who are only trying to help you and other progenies from San Bernardino.
Freeman Newton [deceased]
(It is our sad duty to advise that Freeman passed away
April 21, 2012. R.I.P. old friend).
++
Randy,
I (and many others here) have answered hundreds of student questions happily. If Kyle had said "I think I have learned [such and such] but am having trouble understanding [such and such]" I would have been more than pleased to assist him. But when I think that a student will gain nothing from our time, I wonder what is the point.
We don't print most of the student inquiries when they put no effort in. Here is one we 'rejected' today.
"description on gaseous carburising process indicting typical carburising atmospheres,temp ranges, & times. explain the basic mettallurgical principles of carbusising with particular reference to stell microstructures. indicate the typical compositions of carbursising steels and provide some graphs of typical achievable hardness profiles. provide an explanation of the origin of residual streeses in carburising and why this factor helps to improve rolling contact fatigue enfurance
--sheth, west yourkshire,u.k."
That was obviously not from a grade school student, but from a college student carefully programmed to spend zero time thinking :-(
Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
When am I going to learn that I shouldn't take a sip of anything before reading one of Freeman's responses? My monitor and keyboard always end up with spray all over them. Gud tu heer frum yu ugain, thar, Freeman. Nice to know you're still your (un)usual self!
Thanks for that excerpt from one of today's student emails, Ted. Good grief! Guess I shouldn't be surprised, however. I honestly don't see how you folks at Finishing.com make time to handle all of the stuff that comes at you every day. Yes, Kyle, please break away from your X-Box and skateboard for 90 seconds or so and give us some info about yourself. We're standing by. My parents own a home in the foothills, about 30 minutes from San Bernardino. They wonder why I don't want to move back to California.
Randall Fowler - Fowler Industrial Plating, LLC
Cleveland, Tennessee, USA
2002
I'm a student who stumbled into this site through google. I am doing a project for school, however, this does not mean that I'm going to copy/paste your writing onto my work. If you want to know about my project... I'm designing a product. It's for geography, I have decided to include titanium in this product. So I would like to know where it can be found (other than Australia) and roughly how much it would cost per some unit of weight. Is that too much to ask from metallurgical geniuses such as yourselves?
Robert M- St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada
2003
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Robert, your answers will be found on one page at http://www.titaniumcorporation.com/titanium.htm. Good luck with it. I'm not a metallurgist, and certainly no genius, but it doesn't take a genius to recognize that little education takes place if a student's idea of research is to just to ask someone. If your teacher wants you to ask someone, why not just ask him/her? Ted Mooney, P.E. Striving to live Aloha finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey 2003 2003 attn: Robert M Robert, Seeing that you are a scribe of GOOGLE ... Then goest thou and hit ASSOCIATED TITANIUM SERVICES ... lo and behold, you will find a multitude of things about titanium. But if you play around with words,in this case TITANIUM, eventually (a minute for you, an hour for geniuses like us) up will pop the answer. The other thing is to have a gander in the Yellow Pages ... in BC we have titanium fabricators and they'd be more able to answer your questions than the illiterati like me. But w But whether they might want to is another question. My regards to St. Catherines ... and to Court Holdings, a superb chrome (maybe now titanium?) plater. Freeman Newton [deceased] (It is our sad duty to advise that Freeman passed away April 21, 2012. R.I.P. old friend). Snippy comments, bad mouthing people that you are asking for help from, is not a swift idea. With that in mind, the only way for you to become a genius is to do some actual research. They do have encyclopedias on line and on cd rom if you cannot make it to the most basic library. Cost of material is directly related to what you can sell it for, so you might take a look a Titanium prices on the commodity exchange, available on you computer. Retail prices have too much "value added" to be a decent reference. Happy researching. James Watts- Navarre, Florida 2003 |
Q. I have a project for titanium due this week and I was wondering if anyone could tell me the physical properties of titanium?
Please and thank-you.
High School School grade 9 - Austin, Texas
2005
Which physical properties do you want to know, Jen? If you tell us which physical properties you want to know, I'll be happy to fill them in for you.
(This is one of the problems with trying to help students on the internet. A student can post a question they don't understand the meaning of; then someone will 'help them', the answer is submitted, and the teacher and parents don't realize the student is actually clueless on the whole subject and doesn't even have any idea what the phrase 'physical properties' means :-)
When a teacher demands answers from books, the student usually has to understand the question in order to look for the answers. If I were a teacher I would only accept books as sources :-)
Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
2005
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