3 ms·

The work hardening when machining titanium is also just brutal, worse than stainless

• nocoiner 11mo ago
  Wasn’t there also some issue with water when the A-12 or SR-71 was being built? Like the local water treatment plant started fluoridating the water or something, and it completely screwed up the production process?
  • kerkeslager 11mo ago
    "Completely screwed up the production process" seems a bit overstatement: with the budgets at stake for these projects, adding a distillation step to the water isn't some massive financial burden.
    • nocoiner 11mo ago
      Fair enough! I think the primary issue was that for a while, no one had any idea why previous processes just stopped working. But my recollection of this is obviously hazy at best.
  • Grosvenor 11mo ago
    Yes. They had to scrap tons of parts until they figured it out. iirc they had to add the impurity back IN to get the process working again.