Affordable Titanium Foam for Aerospace Applications

"This proposal examines the feasibility of using an innovative vacuum-arc casting based technology to produce low cost, closed-cell titanium foam. A preheated mold system reduces the solidification rate of just poured titanium liquid while gas bubbles aregenerated and trapped in the increasingly viscous metal. The approach described herein uses a series of designed experiments to identify and optimize the most important process variables affecting the viability of the process and the quality of the foam.The results of the experiments will be measured by complete pore structural, metal microstructural and overall mechanical properties characterizations at the facilities of the proposing small business and collaborators. Analysis will allow rapidprogression towards a viable foam within the time and funding limitations of Phase I. Industry end user collaboration will be made to identify the most appropriate component(s) of a ballistic missile interceptor vehicle or interceptor vehicle supportsystem on which to demonstrate the foam as the core of a sandwich structure. Sandwich structures made with metal foam cores offer high specific strength, stiffness, energy absorption, vibration and noise damping, and low thermal conductivity compared tomonolithic or conventional metal structural materials. Titanium foam would offer additional benefits relative to currently available aluminum foams, since Ti enjoys an 80% strength-to-weight advantage