If you have a good industrial scale in your shop, you can use it to easily compare the different weights of your scraps. While two tablespoons of steel weigh around 0.5 pounds, an equal amount of tungsten carbide clocks in at over 1.25 pounds!

If you have a spare magnet handy, this is an easy first test to conduct. While iron, steel, cobalt, nickel, and certain stainless steels are all very susceptible to magnetism, carbide is not. That’s because tungsten, in its natural form, is only weakly magnetic, or paramagnetic as it’s known in the scientific world.

At 19.35 g/cm³, tungsten is one of the top five densest metals in the world. In fact, it’s denser than gold, uranium, and mercury. This makes it rather easy to identify by its weight. Even lead, which is known for being a heavy metal, is significantly lighter than pure tungsten.

This webpage provides you the full scope about machining titanium and the questions—and answers—commonly asked about its use for parts and components from a precision machining perspective. Read the entire discussion or jump to the section that interests you by clicking on the links below.

At Specialized Turning, we are experts in machining titanium alloys to produce the best possible quality and value. While each type of titanium has its own intricacies, we match state-of-the-art tooling geometries and coatings to ensure the most economical stock removal rates at the highest speeds possible for economical machining. Our staff has decades of experience in:

Commercially pure Grade 2 titanium is used in a variety of applications and is widely available in many forms. It has high-impact toughness and corrosion resistance. This grade possesses good weldability, strength, ductility, and formability. Grade 2 titanium bar and sheet are the prime choice for many fields of applications, including power generation, medical industry, hydro-carbon processing marine industry applications, and chemical processing.

These tooling challenges can also lead to challenges with parts. As an example, this can cause galling—and tools with sharper corners, such as taps or boring bars, will:

Titanium contains a mixture of titanium and other chemical elements. These alloys have very high tensile strength and toughness—even at extreme temperatures. They are light in weight, have extraordinary corrosion resistance, and the ability to withstand extreme temperatures. Use is primarily limited to industrial applications for military, aircraft, spacecraft, high technology and medical devices.

Unless you have a rare gift for spotting visual differences, carbide can be a difficult metal to identify based on sight alone. That’s because carbide is primarily made from tungsten, which is a very hard, dense material with a dull, greyish color. Unfortunately, so are many other metals.

When it comes to today’s scrap prices, not all metals are created equal. For instance, basic steel will only fetch you about $0.13 per pound. Even copper, which has made national headlines for its resale value, will only net you around $3.50 a pound. Tungsten carbide, on the other hand, is worth its weight in gold, currently sitting at $5.61 for every pound. That’s over 43 times the value of steel!

To avoid this, each part requires careful process planning. By making modifications and creating a proprietary process, Specialized Turning has become an expert at machining titanium and is able to create a more consistent and high-quality part for the customer.

That number is on the rise too, as the price of carbide scrap continues to fluctuate due to the increasing rarity of tungsten and a number of other factors. It stands to reason then, that if you’re using any amount of carbide at all, it pays to separate those scraps from the rest of the metals before recycling.

Spark testing is a great method for determining the general classification of your metal scraps. When put to a high-speed grinding wheel, carbide typically emits short, dark-red sparks. Compare that to mild steel which emits sparks of bright white, and you can easily rule out many common ferrous metals.

For this test, all you need to do is grab a piece of known tungsten carbide and attempt to scratch the piece of scrap. If it scratches easily, it’s probably one of the softer metals listed above. If you see little to no markings, it’s likely carbide.

According to Moh’s scale of mineral hardness, tungsten carbide has a hardness rating of 9, making it one of the hardest metals in the world. Compare that to silver (2.5-3), nickel (4), steel (4-4.5), cobalt (5.5), and hardened steel (8).

Understanding tool limitations is crucial to prevent failures when machining titanium. Preventing work hardening, which occurs when the metal ahead of the cutting tool becomes plastically deformed, is the key to success. This requires advanced planning as well as a thorough understanding of the limitations of the various tooling being used.

Although “commercially pure,” titanium has acceptable mechanical properties and has been used for orthopedic and dental implants; for most applications, titanium is alloyed with small amounts of aluminum and vanadium, typically 6% and 4% respectively, by weight. This mixture has a solid solubility (allowing it to dissolve in a solid, liquid, or gaseous solvent), which varies dramatically with temperature, allowing it to undergo precipitation strengthening. This metallurgic heat treatment process is carried out after the alloy has been worked into its final shape but before it is put to use, allowing much easier fabrication of a high-strength product.

The average tool life varies by tool and a plan needs to be in place to remove and replace the tool as the part is worked. This must be done in consideration of the various operations required to produce the finished part. It is often considered impractical to stop and change a tool in the middle of an operation without negatively affecting the quality of the finished piece. In practice, however, there are times when this must be done, and the titanium machine shop will need to engineer this strategy in advance of the machining process. In summary, each cutting tool should have a planned replacement cycle of use and then be re-sharpened or discarded.

The catch here is that some binding materials in carbide are more magnetic than others. So depending on how it was made, some carbides will be slightly more magnetic than others. Just know that if the metal scrap sticks strongly to the magnet, it’s unlikely to be carbide.

Grade 7 is an alloyed grade and is mechanically and physically equivalent to Grade 2, except with the addition of palladium, making it an alloy. Grade 7 possesses excellent weldability and fabrication qualities, and is the most corrosion resistance of all titanium alloys. In fact, it is most resistant to corrosion in reducing acids. Grade 7 is used in chemical processes and production equipment components.

This is an easy one. While steel and many other non-coated metals will rust over time, carbide will not. So if you see any amount of rust on your scraps, you know it’s not carbide. Of course, nickel, stainless steel, and other corrosion-resistant metals will also avoid oxidation, so this should never be the only test you conduct.

The high amount of energy required to separate titanium is one of a few primary factors of the high price of machining this tough metal. Once on the tooling floor, machining is costly. When machining titanium, we must consider some tough restrictions on machining parameters that can affect:

Now that you’ve sold your scraps and turned a hefty profit, it’s time to purchase more stock for your shop. If you want the highest quality tungsten carbide at competitive prices, look no further than Complete Carbide. Check out our full inventory of carbide rods and STB strips today.

The most popular of the titanium alloys is Ti 6Al-4V, or Grade 5 titanium. It accounts for 50% of total titanium usage the world over. Ti 6Al-4V may be heat treated to increase its strength and can be used in welded assemblies at service temperatures of up to 600° F. This alloy offers its high strength at a light weight, useful formability, and high corrosion resistance. Ti 6AI-4V’s usability makes it the best alloy for use in several industries, including aerospace, medical, marine, and chemical processing industries.

If you have carbide scraps or shavings to sell, we will happily take them off your hands. Contact us today to discuss a quote.

While titanium’s strength and toughness make it the ideal choice for use in extreme environments, it also poses major challenges for those machining it. While titanium is fairly stable, it generally holds up well to tight tolerance and location callouts.

If you own a machine shop or are otherwise in possession of a large amount of metal shavings or scraps, you’re probably already aware that you can make a decent amount of money by selling them to a metal recycler in your area. But if you’re simply selling all your mixed scraps in bulk, you could be leaving a lot of money on the table.

While you can easily rule out copper, brass, and a number of other metals, you’ll probably still be left with a lot of grey scraps that may or may not be carbide. So, how can you tell the difference?