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There is something garbled or simply wrong about this story. The US was the first country to produce metallic titanium on an industrial scale. It has more than

There is something garbled or simply wrong about this story. The US was the first country to produce metallic titanium on an industrial scale. It has more than adequate domestic ores. Titanium is one of the most common metals in the earth's crust; only the conversion from ore to metal is difficult. Here's a good primer on industrial titanium (see chapter 3): "Titanium: Past, Present, and Future" from National Academies Press, 1983 https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/1712/titanium-past-present-and-future https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/1712/titanium-past... In 1948, based on the Bureau's work, E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company built and started production in the world's first titanium sponge production facility. The first commercial titanium from du Pont was melted and processed to sheet by Rem-Cru Titanium and then sold for experimental use to Republic Aviation for the Thunderjet and to North American Aviation for the Sabrejet. Also in 1948, 200 industrial, technical, government, and military leaders met in a Navy-sponsored conference and the titanium industry was off to an enthusiastic start with aircraft designers excited and planning early applications. By 1953, annual production was 2 million pounds, and the Douglas DC-7 flew with titanium nacelles and firewalls. Demand and production grew rapidly. To the aircraft and titanium industries it was euphoria, the first heady upswing in the production curve (Figure 1). ... [by 1958] Military strategy shifted from dependence on manned aircraft to emphasis on missiles, and military demand (then the life-blood of the titanium industry) dropped dramatically and, consequently, so did titanium production and sponge prices. ... The U.S. titanium industry has suffered from these periodic reversals. In the 1950s it was the world leader in both technical know-how and quantitative production but now has lost its early worldwide lead to the Soviet Union and Japan although it continues to meet most domestic titanium needs. So in the early 1960s it sounds like the US actually had more than adequate titanium production capacity. Why use Soviet titanium instead of domestic for the SR-71? Were they trying to conceal the construction of a new titanium aircraft line from domestic titanium suppliers or other domestic parties?

shkkmo 3y ago
You seem to be confusing processing ore into sponge with mining that ore. TFA says that "The US worked through Third World countries and fake companies and finally was able to ship the ore to the US"
- philipkglass 3y ago
  I'm referencing that same National Academies Press book again, this time the chapter about titanium ores: https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/1712/chapter/5 https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/1712/chapter/5 Titanium ore reserves are abundant and widely distributed throughout the world (Figures 7 and 8). U.S. self-sufficiency has declined from 75 percent in the mid-1960s to 45 percent in 1980 because of the ready availability of low-cost concentrates from other countries rather than from a lack of U.S. reserves. In terms of contained titanium, the manufacture of titanium dioxide (TiO2) in the United States is about 15 times greater than the production of titanium metal. An emergency need for additional raw material for metal manufacturing could be met readily by diversion of ore, or of titanium tetrachloride, from the TiO2 industry. Ore cost, about $0.35 per pound of contained titanium, is a minor part of the price of titanium metal. Titanium ore is not rare, expensive, or difficult to find domestically. Producers of titanium minerals listed later in the report include the United States, Canada, Finland, Norway, South Africa, India, the Soviet Union, Malaysia, and Sri Lanka. As of 1983 Canadian and Norwegian production were higher than US production. Soviet production was lower than Norway, Canada, or the US. This report was published 20 years after the SR-71 started flying, but titanium minerals were never rare and they have long been produced in the United States and in closely allied countries. That's why I wonder if there is something to explain "The US worked through Third World countries and fake companies and finally was able to ship the ore to the US" or if it's just a story. To me it reads a bit like a story about how the US tricked the USSR into shipping lead ores to the American small arms industry during the Cold War by saying that deer season was coming up [1]. It sounds clever and funny. But it doesn't make a lot of inherent sense that the US sector would need to clandestinely obtain a common mineral resource from its rival. The very fact that it is good as a story makes me want to understand more before accepting it, because good stories have a way of propagating themselves regardless of their relationship with the truth. [1] Note: I have never heard this story about lead ores. I just made it up on the spot as an example of a story that sounds so good that I would be inherently disinclined to believe it without further evidence.
dharmab 3y ago
I found a bit in Ben Rich's memoirs that said their US supplier for titanium alloys didn't have enough available for them, so they had to purchase from worldwide sources.

shkkmo 3y ago

You seem to be confusing processing ore into sponge with mining that ore. TFA says that "The US worked through Third World countries and fake companies and finally was able to ship the ore to the US"

philipkglass 3y ago
I'm referencing that same National Academies Press book again, this time the chapter about titanium ores: https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/1712/chapter/5 https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/1712/chapter/5 Titanium ore reserves are abundant and widely distributed throughout the world (Figures 7 and 8). U.S. self-sufficiency has declined from 75 percent in the mid-1960s to 45 percent in 1980 because of the ready availability of low-cost concentrates from other countries rather than from a lack of U.S. reserves. In terms of contained titanium, the manufacture of titanium dioxide (TiO2) in the United States is about 15 times greater than the production of titanium metal. An emergency need for additional raw material for metal manufacturing could be met readily by diversion of ore, or of titanium tetrachloride, from the TiO2 industry. Ore cost, about $0.35 per pound of contained titanium, is a minor part of the price of titanium metal. Titanium ore is not rare, expensive, or difficult to find domestically. Producers of titanium minerals listed later in the report include the United States, Canada, Finland, Norway, South Africa, India, the Soviet Union, Malaysia, and Sri Lanka. As of 1983 Canadian and Norwegian production were higher than US production. Soviet production was lower than Norway, Canada, or the US. This report was published 20 years after the SR-71 started flying, but titanium minerals were never rare and they have long been produced in the United States and in closely allied countries. That's why I wonder if there is something to explain "The US worked through Third World countries and fake companies and finally was able to ship the ore to the US" or if it's just a story. To me it reads a bit like a story about how the US tricked the USSR into shipping lead ores to the American small arms industry during the Cold War by saying that deer season was coming up [1]. It sounds clever and funny. But it doesn't make a lot of inherent sense that the US sector would need to clandestinely obtain a common mineral resource from its rival. The very fact that it is good as a story makes me want to understand more before accepting it, because good stories have a way of propagating themselves regardless of their relationship with the truth. [1] Note: I have never heard this story about lead ores. I just made it up on the spot as an example of a story that sounds so good that I would be inherently disinclined to believe it without further evidence.

dharmab 3y ago

I found a bit in Ben Rich's memoirs that said their US supplier for titanium alloys didn't have enough available for them, so they had to purchase from worldwide sources.