January 16, 201610 yr Some of the most impressive examples i can think of from Scot Forge are forging a 40" diameter bar of H13 from a starting cross section of 47" x53" ingot. The challenge with that job was getting all the ingot porosity to forge weld together. Another example of big work is breaking down a rectangular titanium ingot 54x40 that weighed about 50000 pounds. We took it to 24x24 in one heat. That heat lasted 45 minutes. That is the longest continous forging cycle I have seen without reheating.
January 16, 201610 yr 3 hours ago, patrick said: snip...Another example of big work is breaking down a rectangular titanium ingot 54x40 that weighed about 50000 pounds. We took it to 24x24 in one heat. That heat lasted 45 minutes. That is the longest continous forging cycle I have seen without reheating. I have not forged any titanium, does it hold its heat particularly well? How many heats, and of what forging cycle duration would you have expected to move the same size of mild steel? Alan
January 17, 201610 yr Alan commercially pure titanium forges like marshmallows and I mean that literally. When it's hot it takes very little effort to move. That means that it bulges much more to the sides than steel so you have to make more passes to get to the same size than with steel. Also you can work a much bigger pc of ti than steel with the same equipment. We probably would not work such a large cross section of steel with our 3000 ton press. We frequently run 40 inch diameter ingots in steel weighing 40000 pounds on that press and it's probably 20 to 25 minutes to take that size ingot to 24 square.
January 17, 201610 yr Thank you Patrick. Nearest in my experience would be Aluminium or Silicon Bronze I suppose. Interesting food analogy. While we are in such a technical discussion...marshmallow would fit in to my forgeability rating system quite well...I always think of bronze/aluminium as working like spreadable butter, to mild steel's Cheddar and stainless' Parmesan. Wrought iron being somewhere between the bronze and steel...maybe butter direct from the fridge! I guess one's parameters are dependant on the power of the press/hammer you are working with. Just imagine a system that would work steel like a mature Brie, or unlock stainless' thixotropic properties like ketchup! Alan
January 18, 201610 yr Some of the ultra high speed machining work is based on properties that only become apparent when you are out at the extremes of working stuff.
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