Computational Design and Development of New High-Strength, High-Ductility Castable Titanium Alloys

QuesTek Innovations has applied its Materials by Design® approach to invent, design, and develop three new castable titanium alloys with strength and ductility characteristics similar to wrought titanium (e.g., wrought Ti-6Al-4V).  The development of these alloys has been sponsored by a U.S. Army-funded Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program administered through Picatinny Arsenal, New Jersey.  QuesTek’s titanium alloy computational design has considered a number of important factors including strength, toughness, alpha/beta transformation kinetics, and castability/solidification.  The new alloys have been designed to be lower cost in terms of: 1) Near-net-shape formability (castability); 2) Raw materials (alloying additions); 3) Tolerance to impurities (e.g., oxygen and/or iron); and 4) Overall ease of processing (e.g., response to hot isostatic pressing, and overall microstructural and mechanical property robustness with respect to cooling rate after heat treatment).  Results will be presented from initial prototype wedge castings, further commercial-scale ingot production, ongoing alloy specification development efforts (ASTM and AMS), and first-round Army component production and testing.  QuesTek is seeking partnerships (titanium casting designers, titanium alloy producers, titanium foundries, etc.) to further commercialize its new castable titanium alloy technologies.