Institute of Metals Division - Correlation Between Microstructure and Resistivity of Transforming Ti-Mn Alloys

Observations were made of the isothermal transformation and quench and reheat transformation characteristics of binary titanium alloys containing nominally 6 wt pct and 10 wt pct Mn at temperatures of 700°, 600°, 500°, and 400°C. A large change in electrical resistivity attends the beta to alpha transformation in these alloys. The correlation between the resistivity and microstructure provides a very sensitive means of following the transformation. IN a recent paper, Wyatt' determined the electrical resistivity of several grades of unalloyed titanium metal as a function of temperature. In addition to the expected discontinuity accompanying the a-B transformation, it was shown that s-Ti has a much larger temperature coefficient of resistance than 8. The result would be a very large change in resistivity attending ß?a: transformation if it were possible to retain the ß structure at room temperature in pure titanium. From these data, it was reasoned that this very large resistance change should accompany the decomposition of the ß phase in alloys in which the ß phase can be retained by quenching to room temperature from the ß field. This effect is illustrated schematically in Fig. 1. Binary Ti-Mn alloys containing more than 5 wt pct Mn can be quenched to retain ß from the ß field. While the ß phase would be expected to transform in these alloys to a + TiMn via a eutectoid reaction,' it has been observed that the eutectoid decomposition does not occur readily in hypoeutectoid alloys, but rather the decomposition of the ß occurs by rejection of proeutectoid a only." Thus, the resistivity should show a marked decrease, as the a: phase is rejected from ß and a study of the resistivity of solution treated and isothermally transformed or quenched and reheated alloys should provide an excellent means of establishing the transformation kinetics of these alloys at various temperatures. The usual metallographic method of determining the transformation temperature-time characteristics of alloys of this type is very satisfactory for deter- mining the time required to initiate the rejection of the a phase at temperatures relatively close to the ß/a: + ß boundary when the rejected a is coarse, and a typical Widmanstaetten structure is produced. The metallographic method is less satisfactory for this purpose at lower temperatures where a fine nodular decomposition product is observed and is very unsatisfactory for the determination of the time required to complete the transformation at any temperature. Accordingly, specimens were prepared for resistivity measurements in order to determine the transformation characteristics of the alloys.