Just curious if anyone knows of or has the ability to weld titanium, such as Ti exhaust tubing.
Um yeah, hi.
Good to know for future purchases :tbu
How do you weld yours? Argon bubble or whatever its called?
Depends on what I’m welding(size). If it’s small enough I put int in the welding chamber, I also have a larger inflatable chamber as well. Other stuff I seal and backpurge with equipment designed for the very purpose of welding larger diameter tubing.
Good to know. I almost bought a Ti exhaust today for my S2000 but everyone seems to have issues over time with the titanium splitting. If I come across a used Amuse R1 exhaust that’s broken I might buy it if the price is right and have it repaired.
heat cycled dirty titanium is very difficult to weld. not only are you dealing with the titanium oxide but also the carbon precip from the exhaust. the proper method of repairing a crack in something like this would be to completely cut the cracked piece out and weld in a new piece after proper prep(Ie if it was a crack in a pie piece or a mandrel), not just weld over where it’s cracked. It’ll certainly crack right there again. if it’s in a straight section at a joint, the joint can be cut out and then welded back up again but you shorten the system up by however wide the cut is. almost all of my titanium welding is repair work though FWIW.
Of all the titanium exhausts that I have repaired in the past, all of the causes of cracked weld joint repairs we obvious improper welding procedure from the start.
Understood.
Titanium is a wild material to work with. Every Amuse exhaust I’ve seen its always the square box resonator that comes apart and splits. Like you said, many have removed the resonator or have a new titanium plate welded in. I can imagine trying to properly clean the area to be repaired is a pain especially for an exhaust. Amuse started making a header in full titanium that I don’t see how it can’t split due to vibration and temperature changes.
I have a Spoon shift knob that’s hollow titanium that tore/split years ago where the threads are maybe someday Ill have it repaired lol.
This is usually what happens on the resonator:
Adam really knows his shit. Just from reading what hes saying i can 100% grasp he knows whats up.
Lol, that’s a good one. The flat surface of the resonator/muffler there has been heat cycled in a non uniform manner. any time a flat panel of any metal is under those condition and then heated again the panel grows at different rates across it’s surface. that’s the non-tech explanation. The joints material did not expand as much as the flat panel and it cracked, but due to the material having different hardness across its surface the force had cracks propogate during every heat cycle. A good backfire can easily cause this as well.
There’s really only one way to properly fix that pictured issue there and that’s to replace the muffler or resonator. repairing that would just have issue down the road.
Likely the material used in sheet form was 6al4v, a grade 5 TI. not the best choice for this. Grade 2 or 4 would have been a better choice, more pure of a titanium and much better for welding. 6al4v has excellent thermal properties but must be done some uniformly as is better suiting to tubing or machined parts like flanges and couplings… Grade 4 is more forgiving. when it’s all said and done, normalizing the entire can is almost a must.
Reading this makes me so happy I didn’t drop $3K on a titanium exhaust lol.
Just need to know what you’re buying. Typically you do not want a flat panel in a titanium exhaust like in that muffler unless using 16G+ material. Better to make it from round tubing, and the end caps really need to be flanged, not butt welded. There are ways to make baffled mufflers from round tubing but if you’d putting money into such an exhaust it makes no sense to me to do so vs pass through. Titanium sings anyway and adds it’s own unique note to the tone of the exhaust in most cases.
Anyway if you ever need me to do something just give me a a shout. next time a Ti repair job comes to the shop I’ll let you know and have you swing in.
Sounds good!
GO TO BED, At least I have an excuse for being up this early :ahh
I have to work tonight at 10PM, if I go to bed it will fuck my sleep schedule up lolol