Hurting Titanium ?????

[Bart student]

Hello folks,


I don't really have time to make lots of knives right now, but I do have time to toy with some knives I own. Some of them happen to be a couple of Benchmades pinnacles.
They would look cool when they are anodized or maybe surface finished some other way then bead-blasted (which scratches way tooo easy IMHO ).

But I have a few questions before I potentially ruin the knives.

1. Are repeated heats, maybe even red-hot, damaging to the spring capacities of Ti (they are frame locks)? I dunno how Ti works, but if it is heat-treathed somehow for spring capacities or toughness, I might ruin the whole point of that proces. I know Alu is HT'ed

2. The scales have steel inserts... anyone know how they are fixed and if they might be a problem in Heat-coloring the Ti? I imagine steel and Ti have different reactions to heat sooooo... ????

3. How hard is it to drill Ti, 6AL4V, with cobalt and HSS drills? I know how to resharpen my drills, so dulling them is no problem

Thanks for the answer in advance. Any help will be really .. helpfull

Greetz and take care all, Bart.

P.S. Happy newyear all and may all your wishes for the new year come true, you all deserve it.

 

[Jim Smyth]

Well here goes a try at your questions.

1. I have used a torch on thinner Ti for bending it for pocket clips and after it is cooled and finished it seems as tough as when it was new, still springy. With Ti you can bend and bend it, seems like forever before it will not return to its orginal shape, very forgiving. Also while grinding the stuff it gets red hot with very hot and blinding sparks so I dont think heat hurts it at all.

2. I'm not familiar with the knife inserts you are talking about but steel and Ti will react differently to heat. How much I dont know for sure but I would find out how those inserts are attached and remove them if its a problem beforehand.

3. I use the cheap HSS drills for all my drilling of Ti. Drill on the slowest speed your drill press can do. If you want them to last a little longer, I use a real small paint brush and a little tapping oil while drilling, seems to work well for me. I used to resharpen all my drills but they are so cheap I dont bother any more.

From my experience if a knife isnt cared for the Ti will scratch real easy with any finish. I use ceramic beads for blasting and they give the best all round results.