Strengthening strategy for a ductile metastable β-titanium alloy using low-temperature aging

While omega precipitates in metastable beta titanium alloys are typically considered embrittling and consequently deleterious to the mechanical properties, this paper demonstrates that low-temperature aging (LTA) treatments for short time periods can in fact enhance the yield strength while preserving substantial elongation-to-failure in omega containing beta titanium alloys. LTA treatments, carried out on a ductile beta metastable Ti-12Mo alloy, significantly improve the yield strength of the material (similar to 55% increase as compared to solution-treated samples) while keeping both TRIP/TWIP effects and a large elongation-to-failure (epsilon = 0.4 in true strain), resulting in a balance of mechanical properties. [GRAPHICS] .