Why Is Titanium not used in Paintball

[Puddleglum]

Being an avid mountain-biker, I see a lot of titanium frames and components in that field. It seems to be extremely strong, lighweight, and pretty easy to work with.

But it is not used at all in Paintball(at least to my knowledge) And I would like to know why. I would think that a Titanium SFL E-mag would be well........really light.
Or, a titanium bolt.

Especialy AGD, has this material been tried, and why is it not used. I'm sure I am not the first person who has asked this question.

[Cliffio]

they make ti hammers, ball detents, triggers, breech knobs all for the angel

they are REALLY hard to find but they are out there

i remember something about this, actually it was abou a bolt but i dont reemmber why they said it wasnt used

anyways

i dunno, would answer your question:)

Cliff

[thecavemankevin]

actually a company used to make titanium bolts for the mag....not exactly sure why its no longer in production. My guess is though it wasn't a very popular item due to its expensive nature...???

Furthermore, i don't believe it is used much do to the expensive nature in machining it. As we all know titanium is strong, very stong! In fact so strong it takes very expensive machine bits (tipically diamond tip) to machine titanium.

So that might be why you don't see it more often, and don't expect a titanium SFL either (to darned expensive=not enough demand).

[FeelTheRT]

don't forget titanium pump arms for Cockers, and titanium Boomsticks!

[SGTKennedy]

i think it is hard to machine. and wouldnt last as long as SS.

and wouldnt save enough weight compared to aluminum to justify cost.

[Krazy Ivan]

It isn't THAT much weight taken off, and also it doesn't wear as good as stainless steel.

[Butterfingers]

As part of our e-magnum project we looked into making titanium mainbodies...

If you want to pay $400 for a titanium mainbody please let me know.

Titanium does not have enough shear resistance as hardened stainless thus cannot be used as an automag bolt.

Titanium is MUCH more expensive than aluminum.

Titanium IS heavier than aluminum per given volume. Aluminum is approx 2 times lighter than titanium... The weight savings you see in titanium is because they use such thin sections of it to make frames. If you make a frame the same dimensions and tube thickness as aluminum it would weigh 2 times more.

[hitech]

AGD made some valves out of Titamium. There was so little difference some were accidentally sold.

[Jonno06]

yea,i was just talking to my stepbrother about Titanium Boomsticks...they cost about 200$....for what???i want my paint to shoot straight,and hit what im aiming at,i could care less about weight....

[BlackVCG]

Titanium does not belong in paintball at all. It is a good engineering material, has many benefits and is now manufactured enough that just about anyone can get access to it. However, it doesn't have the mechanical properties needed for anything in paintball. Titanium would not work as a bolt because it galls. In other words it has poor "rubbing" characteristics. Titanium belongs in the Aerospace and Automotive Industries to name a few. Paintball is not one of them.

[ProjectMag]

Titanium belongs in golf, too! :D

[zads27]

Originally posted by BlackVCG
Titanium belongs in the Aerospace and Automotive Industries to name a few.

Indeed.. Speaking on behalf of the automotive racing people, even we don't use titanium all that often.
Most of our car parts that are manufatured at the shop I'm most closely associated with are aluminum, many parts on the cars we order are aluminum..

Why?
Aluminum is lighter, easier to work with, better heat dissipation (kinda.. for radiators, intercoolers, oil coolers, tranny coolers..), etc etc, and number one on the list:
100x CHEAPER. (not really 100, but when you're building a car from basically all aftermarket parts, it seems like 100)

Blah blah, basically we'd be lost without aluminum and carbon fiber.


EDIT: While on the subject, anyone have 91-96' 300zx TT Titanium valve retainers for cheap?? (one of the few ti parts I will ever put in my personal car) :D

[Fred]

the subject of Titanium usage in paintball comes up fairly often on the Tinker' Guild.

The metal itself is really expensive, and machining it is very hard because it burns (IIRC) if you're not careful.

the only advantage would be that you can make it a lot thinner, because it is a lot stronger than aluminum.

Manike can tell you all about it, he has spent time with the guys at McLaren who make Titanium parts for the F1...

---Fred

[Rooster]

There is also a rampant misconception that titainium is stronger than steel. While steel has varring strengths, titainium is no stronger than what we normally think of as steel. The main difference is that its about 3 times lighter.

[Cliffio]

Originally posted by bunkerhugger
Don't forget the reactiveness of Titanium with Nitrogen.

but we dont use "nitrogen" we use N2
which has totally differnt properties than stright nitrogen

ever tried to "huff" N2??
wont work, know why? n2 is a different chemical make-up and wont have the same effect

Cliff

[Cliffio]

aluminum would make horrible bolts

they take too much force to be made from aluminum

your gonna ruin an aluminum bolt REALLY easy

Cliff

[Cliffio]

but plastic is 100x cheaper than aluminum

[Hexis]

Originally posted by lilthugbobby
would last longer than darwin or plastic like supper bolt

Does darwin last longer than delrin?

Survival of the fittest materials?

[MagDog68]

LoL Hexis - you beat me to it.

~Fred

[Spaceman613]

Am I the only one confused about what Cliffio was trying to say about nitrogen?

I think he may be confusing nitrous oxide and nitrogen....

[Shaft]

Originally posted by Cliffio


but we dont use "nitrogen" we use N2
which has totally differnt properties than stright nitrogen

ever tried to "huff" N2??
wont work, know why? n2 is a different chemical make-up and wont have the same effect


I concur Spaceman...
Clifio... WHAR?!?!! :confused:

[bob87]

can we make N2 tanks out of titanium? that might make a light wate tank that is smaller that the fiber thanks

[Spaceman613]

Smaller? How, the volume would be smaller too. Besides, I dont think tanks weigh all that much. The fiber is strong becuase it is wrapped around the tank, using the tensile strength of the fiber to hold the aluminum inner tank together.

Ti just doesnt have too many practical and useful places in paintball. In fact, I cant think of one place where it would be a benefit. Annodized aluminum is ver durable and looks good. Where more strength is needed, we use carbon fiber, fiberglass, or Stainless Steel.

I think the only reason this is even brought up, is because DYE makes the Ti-boomer, and the metal is still considered "exotic." Most people dont understand how and why materials are selected in engineering and production.

Heck, I still like brass as a barrel material :)

[Hexis]

We don't use Nitrogen (which in it's normal state is n2). We use HPA. High Pressure Air.

At least I have never seen a field filling tanks with purified nitrogen.

It would be a waste. "Air" is about 78% Nitrogen (n2) and 21% Oxygen (o2). There are other things in there, but all under 1%.

[DiRTyBuNNy]

How about Ti Drops?

[Spaceman613]

I have seen N2 being used as propellant. There is no permormance difference, so whatever a field/team has access to at the best cost is what they use. Some may use N2, most use hpa...

But I HAVE seen it, and I have read about tournaments using it in the recent past in the ragazines

[Spaceman613]

Originally posted by DiRTyBuNNy
How about Ti Drops?

Aluminum works well for drops. Ti would be heavier unless there is physically less material. At that point, you may have flexing of the drop.

Aluminum can also be matched in the pretty colors of your gun too...

[Cliffio]

Originally posted by Spaceman613
in the ragazines

HEY SCOOBY.........scooby dooby do where are you...

anyways, what i was trying to get at is that, we dont use pure nitrogen, so it wouldnt react with Ti

altho i went about it all wrong, its what i meant:)

Cliff

[Fred]

I am having trouble seeing how N2 (which has NO free electrons to do any reacting with) will do anything with Titanium.

I'm not sure if Titanium corrodes, I think it is like Aluminum in that it forms an oxide layer, but I don't know the facts exactly.

Nitrogen, is essentially the same as HPA. Nitrogen (N2) makes up the vast magority of what we breath. The only advantage that I can see of using Purified N2 instead of compressed air is that it might keep your marker a little bit cleaner.

[DiRTyBuNNy]

I don't think you'd see as much flexing as you would imagine..the whole advantage to Ti is using less material with no loss in strength..so a smaller amount of Ti would have the same strength as a bigger piece of Aluminium...and BTW you can anno Ti...

[Spaceman613]

I know you can anno Ti, but it wont have the same color spectrum. Try to anno a piece of 6061 AL, and 2024 or some other alloy, it wont have the same color. Ti will be similar. The alloys have to be the same to get a good match. But thats besides the point. I think raw or matte Ti would look pretty darn cool.

As for the flexing, if you remove enuff material to keep the same weight, you will have thinner parts, and there fore will be flexible, it may come out to be the same as the aluminum part. Ill have to look it up... I cant rememebr the mechanical characteristics off the top of my head.

But I just dont see the benefit. Aluminum is so nice to machine. Ti is more "interesting" and needs more care. Cost would go up, you cant use the less expensive tooling to cut it. Like I said before, I dont see anywhere where the benefits of the material come into use for paintball. Now the cool factor has it, but if you want really cool, there are better materials for that.

[Thordic]

Originally posted by Hexis
We don't use Nitrogen (which in it's normal state is n2). We use HPA. High Pressure Air.

At least I have never seen a field filling tanks with purified nitrogen.

It would be a waste. "Air" is about 78% Nitrogen (n2) and 21% Oxygen (o2). There are other things in there, but all under 1%.

Actually, I've seen fields use N2. You can get N2 cheap in big bulk tanks from gas supply places. And it comes in 6K PSI too, which I can see being handy.