Titanium Metal Cube 99.5%
Titanium Metal Cube 99.5%
What's more valuable than gold and platinum? Titanium, if you go by credit card marketers who apparently figure this must be the ultimate mark of exclusivity. In truth, titanium is dirt common. Sand common to be more exact. Go to any beach and a handful of sand is bound to have some rutile which is titanium's main ore.
If there was any doubt about it being a common metal consider that hundreds of thousands of tons of titanium each year wind up in.... wait for it.... paint cans! Titanium oxide is what gives paint its opaque body. A perfect white for hospital halls and, of course, every wall in every house and building since all paints start out as white and are turned into all the colors of the rainbow only after dyes are swirled in.
Not to say that titanium is cheap per se. It is ten times costlier than steel, for the raw material, and its machining requires special equipment and training that drives up the cost of machined parts that much more.
But not so expensive that picking up a cube or two is going to be too upsetting to your wallet ;-)
10mm cube weight is 4.5±0.2g, 75g for the 25.4mm and ~570g for the 50mm.
Frequently Asked Questions About Titanium Cubes from Luciteria Science
+ What is Titanium?
When you want a metal that represents endurance, strength, fortitude, and power, few metals can top titanium!
Named for the proto-deities and later monsters of ancient Greece, titanium in its natural form is found in ores known as rutile, ilmenite, and its semiprecious gemstone form, sphene, known as titanite to laypeople. Rutile commonly occurs in the sand, especially the kind you see on beaches. Titanium requires special handling to refine and form, which makes it deceptively expensive on the open market in its manufactured forms despite its relative ubiquity in the natural environment.
Because titanium is roughly twice as strong as aluminum and about half as dense as steel, titanium is used in the aerospace industry for modern airframes such as the SR-71 Blackbird, which still holds the world record for fastest air-breathing (i.e. not spacefaring) manned aircraft, which it set in 1976. Because of its uniquely high biocompatibility and the fact it’s almost completely nonreactive to seawater, chlorine, and aqua regia, which is a concentrated solution of nitric and hydrochloric acid capable of dissolving otherwise nonreactive elemental metals including gold, titanium is frequently used in medical implants such as artificial joints, limbs, and even hearts!
Luciteria Science sells titanium samples in both raw ore and refined forms such as sphere set and cube formats, up to 99.7% pure titanium. Keep reading for gift guides and available formats of titanium and other element samples!
+ What are titanium’s chemical properties?
Titanium is a Rare Earth Element and a transition metal, which means the electrons it has available to form bonds with other atoms orbit in two “shells” around the nucleus instead of only one. Its symbol is TI, with an atomic number of 22 (the number of protons in the nucleus) and an atomic mass of 47 (the number of protons and neutrons in the nucleus). In its refined form at room temperature, titanium is a shiny metal with a white-silvery color, low density, and high strength. It oxidizes readily at high temperatures to protect the metal from further damage, but is nearly nonreactive to chlorine, strong acids such as aqua regia, and seawater and doesn’t tarnish easily at room temperature.
Titanium has a melting point of 1660˚C/~3034˚F and a boiling point of 3287˚C /~5949˚F. Titanium’s melting point is triple that of aluminum and slightly higher than iron, but only about half the melting point of tungsten! See our article on Luciteria Science’s 10mm, 25.4mm (1 inch), and 50 mm tungsten cubes for more information about this.
+ Is a titanium cube expensive, and why does your element collection need one?
In its natural forms, titanium is literally as common as dirt and can be found in igneous and sedimentary rock and sand deposits around the world. Titanium dioxide is used in modern paint to give it its bright white color and is in fact considered a paint color in its own right; other shades, tints, and hues of paint are produced by adding various dyes to the base, which is almost always titanium dioxide.
The reason titanium is so expensive in its refined form is the fact it is difficult to refine and manufacture into a purified form. This requires special training and facilities, and only around 90,000 metric tons of titanium metal is produced worldwide each year, versus 4.3 million metric tons of titanium dioxide, which is much easier to harvest via standard chemical extraction methods. Once it has been harvested, it must be alloyed. The most common titanium alloy used across industries and applications is known as Grade V, “the workhorse alloy” or Ti-6Al-4V. This titanium alloy is composed of roughly 89.55% titanium, 6% aluminum, 4% vanadium, a maximum of 0.25% iron, and 0.2% oxygen. Thus you can see the name tells you the three key components and their percentages!
Titanium Cube
Luciteria Science’s titanium cube samples are designed to fit neatly into our special Lucite acrylic display cases and your budget! Our 10mm cube starts at only $6.50, making it affordable for novice elements collectors and veteran element hounds alike!
+ What are some common uses for titanium?
Titanium has a wide range of uses in high-performance precision applications such as healthcare, orthodontics, architecture, construction, manufacturing, military applications, and aerospace. It is also used as a base pigment in roughly 2/3 of all commercially available paints. One of the few applications titanium is not useful in is ballistic body armor. Although it can withstand a direct hit from a high-caliber round, titanium tends to shatter when struck with a high-energy round from a military-grade weapon. Titanium is sometimes used in the joints of body armor, but a typical ballistic vest will use steel or ceramic thrust and strike plates to achieve the best balance between weight and protection. However, titanium is an excellent material for weapons such as rockets and platforms such as aircraft engines. Check out the Internet and see what other common uses for titanium you can find. Odds are there’s more of it around you than you might think. You may even have it on your walls right now!
+ I’m interested in element collecting, but how can I be sure your titanium cube is really titanium, and the aluminum is actually aluminum? Also, how many titanium atoms does an elemental cube contain?
Each Luciteria Science density cube set contains real functional reference elements samples that are used in high-precision physics and chemistry laboratories like CERN to verify equipment calibration. Because of this, they have to be machined to the tightest possible tolerances to comply with both purity and advertising standards, which is one of the reasons we get such great customer feedback. A 99.7% pure titanium metal 10mm density cube has a molar mass of 4.50g (~.0948 mole) and contains 6.022x10^23 atoms per mole. Knowing this, we can multiply 6.022x10^23(.0948) to find your 10mm titanium cube contains approximately 5.708856×10^22 atoms! By contrast, 1 cubic centimeter of aluminum has a molar mass of 2.70g. So if a customer purchased our educational toy elemental cube set of non-alloy copper, titanium, aluminum, iron, and carbon, you can calculate the molar density of each to determine approximately how many atoms each sample contains for yourself! To verify the titanium sample actually is what we say it is, there are a couple of ways to tell, other than the molar calculation test formula given above. First, titanium is non-magnetic. However, so are many other metallic elements. Thus, you can determine an element is not magnetic, but that by itself won’t prove you have titanium. The benefit here is that it’s a nondestructive test which won’t damage or alter the sample in any way. A second way to tell is also easy, but it is a lot harder on the sample. Applying an angle grinder to iron or steel will throw off reddish-orange sparks. Aluminum does not spark at all. Titanium shows distinctive, blindingly blue-white sparks when ground. Also, if you do this, you can look at the exposed metal, which will be a dark silver color. Compare this to aluminum as a visual indicator. You can also shave off a thin strip, since you’re damaging the sample anyway, and hold it in an open flame. It will burn the same way as a magnesium strip and with similar eye-searing results. You should absolutely NOT do this around flammable materials, without a fire extinguisher and other safety materials at hand or while looking directly at the strip. Note: Some of these testing methods WILL damage the finish and appearance of the sample and may cause health and safety hazards, so we strongly recommend you don’t try them at home! There are other, more sophisticated ways to verify the sample is titanium, but most of these can only be done in a laboratory or with specialized equipment and safety training. For safety reasons we will not list them here, but you can find them easily on the internet if you care to look!
+ Does Luciteria Science sell alloy titanium cubes, copper bars, or cubes set?
Unlike some other companies, Luciteria Science sells only 99.5+% pure samples of elements such as gold, titanium cube samples, and carbon. Thus, we don’t sell any cube sets containing tungsten alloy, copper sulfide, titanium dioxide or similar alloys and compounds. Each metal cube sample for element collection must meet our stringent quality policy and meet special, precise standards before we make it available for customers to add to cart for purchase. In addition, our customer service and responsiveness have made thousands of element collectors worldwide very happy with their purchases. Our mirror cubes are also very popular, and of course, our amazing titanium metal standard density cube 10x10x10mm at .045 kilo (just under 5 grams) is always a show-stopper! Our 25.4mm/1 inch titanium crystalline metal 99.7% pure titanium metal cube for element collection weighs in at a beefy 73g.
+ Does Luciteria Science have other element cubes available?
We do! We offer an educational element cube set which includes titanium, carbon, copper, iron, aluminum, and a starter display case. We also offer elements including tungsten, gold, silver, bismuth, carbon, and many more in our signature Lucite display cubes or 99.5+%-pure element cubes. Some elements are also available in rounds, spheres, natural, and ore form. Our Lucite acrylic cube samples come in two formats:
- Anodized: Titanium changes color readily in the presence of conductive media and electricity. Depending upon the voltage, a layer of the metal so thin the eye can see through it to the underlying material turns brownish or indigo, much like niobium. Luciteria’s anodized titanium samples feature an attractive one-inch egg-shaped piece of titanium in an eye-catching indigo with blue at the center of the sightline and brilliant violet at the edges regardless of which angle you view it from. The egg is housed in our signature Lucite acrylic cube with the element’s name, chemical symbol and atomic number on the side for easy identification, designed and crafted to fit easily into our Lucite acrylic display cases.
- Crystalline: At the molecular level, like almost all metals, titanium has a crystalline structure. However, until a century or so ago, viewing that structure with the naked eye was impossible. The process used to manufacture macro-scale titanium crystals is both too slow and expensive to be practical for standard industrial usages, even though it results in the highest possible purity. Because of this, “grown” metallic crystals such as our crystalline titanium are more valuable as curiosities and for their aesthetic value than in commercial applications. Luciteria’s crystalline titanium samples exceed 99.99% purity and showcase the true color of refined titanium to its best advantage in attractive shapes which combine the structure of crystals with the organic appearance of feathers, evergreens and some flowers. Each sample is housed in our signature Lucite acrylic cube with the element’s name, chemical symbol and atomic number on the side for easy identification, designed and crafted to fit easily into our Lucite acrylic display cases. Check out our shop and see what titanium cube and other element samples we have to offer!
+ What sizes of elements collection cubes does Luciteria Science offer, and do you sell specific mass (i.e. 1kg) samples?
Our 99.5+% pure elements cubes are available in the following sizes and finishes: 10mm flat and polished 25.4mm/1 inch both flat and polished 50mm both flat and polished
At this time all our cubes are machined to specific dimensions, not by mass. The reason for this is because precision machining and polishing a cube of a precise density would increase the price points of our samples to place them beyond the reach of casual collectors. Our mirrored polished cubes, including titanium are polished in a lapping machine and final touches are executed by hand. This additional process does add some cost to the titanium mirrored polished cubes, but the results are fantastic. They reflect light like a mirror and shine like a well polished precious metal. At Luciteria Science, we believe the elements should be accessible to all, which is why we emphasize sizes and shapes which look and feel good rather than focusing on specific densities.