Feasibility study: trial application of grain boundary plane enginering to commercially pure titanium

This feasibility study has been inspired by presentations and discussions at a conference of the EPSRC-funded Grain Boundary Engineering Network. It aims to assess if it is feasible to grain boundary engineer (GBE) commercially pure titanium, where GBE refers to the application of specialised thermomechanical processing in order to modify the population of specific boundary types to give more so-called 'special' boundaries. So far GBE has only been successful in cubic materials, and moreover there are relatively few studies in general of grain boundary structure in hexagonal metals. The new concept of 'grain boundary plane engineering will be explored, that is, the adaptation of low temperature/long duration anneals to promote more 'special' grain boundary planes. A novel, advanced electron backscatter diffraction based technique to measure all five grain boundary parameters (misorientation and plane) will be used. The experimental work will be carried out in conjunction with Carnegie Mellon University in the USA, where the new technique was developed. If the study demonstrates that it is feasible to GBE the grain boundary network in titanium, then it will be followed by a full grant proposal to EPSRC, probably joint with the National Science Foundation, in collaboration with colleagues in the USA.