Word: titanium
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...itself, it mixes with steel, nickel and other metals to make alloys that can withstand the tremendous jet heat. The U.S. must depend on Africa, however, for 95% of its limited supply. Accordingly, a big hunt was started for substitutes and yielded the most promising wonder metal of all-titanium...
...Titanium, the world's ninth most common element, is almost everywhere in the earth in minute quantities. It has been used for years in a powdered, oxide form to make paints whiter and make them cover better. But titanium combines so readily with any other element that for years it was considered impossible to refine as a pure metal (scientists call it "the streetwalker" because it will pick up anything...
...Government's Bureau of Mines announced it had found the first practical way to refine it into commercially pure form. The Government subsidized experimental pilot plants to process small batches of titanium into sheets, rods, etc. and commercial production of titanium was started by Du Pont and Titanium Metals Corp. But the Air Force wanted titanium desperately not only in its pure state but as an ideal substitute for columbium as a hardening agent in alloys. It pressed for a huge program to boost production to 22,000 tons by 1955 (current production: 3,400 tons a year...
Defense Secretary Charles Wilson has now bought the Air Force argument. He has approved a new $10,000,000 loan for Titanium Metals Corp to expand its pilot plant, and a $26 million loan for Chicago's Crane Co. to build the biggest titanium plant yet planned, near Nashville...
Other battles are fast being won Originally, titanium proved incredibly difficult to machine and work. But dozens of steel companies have been working with the metal, and have found ways around the difficulties. Titanium, only half as heavy as stainless steel and four times as strong as most aluminum alloys, is now replacing both steel and aluminum in aircraft for skins, parts and struts...