Titanium Welding

[SysLink67]

Trying to find someone who does Ti welding in Perth, its for an exhaust.

Cheers

Rob

[brendanw]

Trying to find someone who does Ti welding in Perth, its for an exhaust.

Cheers

Rob

any body that can weld s/s just different filler

[SysLink67]

I thought you have to use TIG for Ti?

Most people use Mig for SS. Hard to find good TIG welders, esp in perth.

[NZM.031]

i thought most people use tig for stainless.

[urtwhistle]

not 100% correct, its hard to find good staino welders in the retail industry.

Try Proserve in Malaga if the work you want done needs to be PRETTY. my work uses them when we need tanks fabbed and they need to look like perfection. on a side note you will end up paying for the quality too.

regards

Chris

[4NTM4N]

you usually use tig for stainless, and yeah u do just use a different filler, the only difference is the melting point for titanium is higher, id be doing a bit of practice before welding a titanium exhaust

[loffe]

I think its easy welding Titanium, don´t forget shielding gas, or it will crack very soon.

A good thing to know is that titanium has a very high meltingpoint (1725ºC), but it oxidixes already in 500ºC in atmospere and becomes a white powder..

[wht510]

I would say welding Titanium is similar to welding aluminium/steel than Stainless. Stainless is a poor conductor of heat, whereas Ti is reasonably good.

Typically everyone uses TIG for stainless, but it depends on the application. Personally I use TIG for welding exhaust systems, but it requires tight tolerances on your joins.

Anyone that can weld with a TIG should be able to have a crack on Ti. What exactly are you welding? If it's an exhaust system or lobster style intercooler pipes, make sure you get the suitable grade of Ti.

I will go out on a limb and say NOBODY uses MIG for Titanium. I've never seen titanium wire to feed through a MIG.

[scotty nm35]

I would love to make my own full lobster exhaust and intakes out of Ti.

Where would you buy the materials without getting bent over? What is the suitable grades for automotive use?

[wht510]

It largely depends on what you can get.

In Melbourne I couldn't find anything. From memory a company called Austral Wright metals used to have something, but I don't think they do any more. Most of the time you have to import it.

Good luck in finding a dealer. I've lost all my contacts

Perhaps try ebay:

stores.shop.ebay.com.au › eBay Stores › TITANIUM JOE

or similar...

Grade 5 (Ti6Al4V) is one good grade, but pretty expensive.

Grade 18 (Ti3Al2.5V) is a good one for exhausts as it has palladium alloyed into the titanium alloy which increases corrosion resistance. But we really are splitting hairs. The best corrosion resistance is stainless though. But can't compete with the lightness of Ti.

Basically as I said before, any titanium alloy is good as long as you can get it as they all share very good corrosion resistance with a light weight.

Unfortunately trying to find someone who can mandrel bend Titanium is non existent. That's why everyone has to do lobster cut/welds. I did ask alloy bull bar manufacturers, but they said they wouldn't look at it due to the strength of Ti compared to Al, even if it was annealed!

Another alloy which is excellent for exhaust headers (ie extractors) particularly for turbo applications is the super alloy "InConel". Now this is better than titanium as it has a higher heat resistance, and therefore is harder to weld. It's used exclusively for super cars and formula 1 and other high end race applications where the engineers have an unlimited budget. But you'd have to buy a couple of tonnes (or something like that), and auction off one of your kidneys at the same time for the funds. I'd only use that for headers though. Not full exhaust systems.

[scotty nm35]

Inconel for headers and dumps im guessing. Titanium starts oxidising at around 500 degrees.

I had a quick ring around and you are right, they all want to import it from the states, 2 to 3 weeks and if you need a price, you cant afford it.

[wht510]

Another way of making tube to your specifications is to roll a sheet into a tube. It only works for narrow sections (as rolling long tubes is a pain), but you can use a rolling machine similar to what the panel beaters use.

I did find that getting 3" tube or 2.5" tube in titanium is a pain. Getting sheet is easy, and all you do is cut the sections you require, roll them into diameter, and weld the ends, then weld the sections together to get your required lobster design. LOTS OF WORK...

[scotty nm35]

Not a bad idea, if it was thin sheet it would roll fairly easily. You could make your own mufflers the same way, don't imagine a Ti muffler would be cheap.

Anyone know how it welds? Easy to blow holes in thin sheet?

[scotty nm35]

I got the quote back for the grade 2 Ti tube from the supplier, minimum order 20 lengths at 3 meters. $204 per meter.

Works out to $12,240 plus GST.

[The BOP]

<br />It largely depends on what you can get.<br />In Melbourne I couldn't find anything. From memory a company called Austral Wright metals used to have something, but I don't think they do any more. Most of the time you have to import it.<br />Good luck in finding a dealer. I've lost all my contacts <img src="http://www.skylinesaustralia.com/forums/style_emoticons/default/sad.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="" border="0" alt="sad.gif" /><br />Perhaps try ebay:<br />stores.shop.ebay.com.au › eBay Stores › TITANIUM JOE <br />or similar...<br /><br />Grade 5 (Ti6Al4V) is one good grade, but pretty expensive.<br />Grade 18 (Ti3Al2.5V) is a good one for exhausts as it has palladium alloyed into the titanium alloy which increases corrosion resistance. But we really are splitting hairs. The best corrosion resistance is stainless though. But can't compete with the lightness of Ti.<br />Basically as I said before, any titanium alloy is good as long as you can get it as they all share very good corrosion resistance with a light weight.<br /><br />Unfortunately trying to find someone who can mandrel bend Titanium is non existent. That's why everyone has to do lobster cut/welds. I did ask alloy bull bar manufacturers, but they said they wouldn't look at it due to the strength of Ti compared to Al, even if it was annealed!<br /><br />Another alloy which is excellent for exhaust headers (ie extractors) particularly for turbo applications is the super alloy "InConel". Now this is better than titanium as it has a higher heat resistance, and therefore is harder to weld. It's used exclusively for super cars and formula 1 and other high end race applications where the engineers have an unlimited budget. But you'd have to buy a couple of tonnes (or something like that), and auction off one of your kidneys at the same time for the funds. I'd only use that for headers though. Not full exhaust systems.<br />

<br /><br /><br />

InConel is not used in supercars as it's classed as exotic materail and is illegal, the best you get in supercars(V8) is 321 grade stainless. And to weld InComel properly you meed a atmostphere of inert gas i.e argon/helium mix is the best I've used to help with the heat normally a 30% mix

[wht510]

HAha... Misunderstanding!

I'm pretty sure the McLaren F1 supercar uses inconel. I'm also fairly certain that Porsche used inconel on some of their more exotic cars such as the Carrera GT. Mercedes also used inconel on their SLR. Not sure about Ferrari's Enzo.. etc. etc. I'm not sure what super cars you are referring to? If you are referring to the current breed of V8 "supercar" dinosaurs, I'll take your word for it, but I don't really classify them as "super cars"....

[chuckie]

Trying to find someone who does Ti welding in Perth, its for an exhaust.

Cheers

Rob

Rob ring L&Fpreformance in welshpool,

Brad Stacy is the welder there & i think they can weld it,ok ,

[ezy_09s]

Inconnel was also used on the gibson motorsport gtr manifolds.

[r33_racer]

Dont you need an atmostphere of inert gas to weld titanium also????

[wht510]

Depends on the application. Typically the usual Argon gas specified for TIG welding is a good enough 'shield' to stop oxidation of the weld when molten. So you just weld the stuff as per usual with the TIG. (making sure you have the right gas in the bottle!)

If you are welding pressure vessel tubing or similar, purging the tube with Argon helps minimise oxidation/porosity when you penetrate through to the other side. It's all fairly straight forward.

For example, if I was welding a Ti tube with a Ti fitting on the end, I would run the torch gas (without welding) into the tube that was taped up on the other end. I'd fill the tube with argon from the torch allowing the oxygen to escape from the other side. Once I think most of the tube is full, I tape up the two holes (one at one end where you put the argon and one at the other which allows the purging to take place, I then start welding.