Die Another Day

It’s my 3rd last day at work today. So far everything i’ve dealt with is steel – stainless steel, carbon steel, steel for heat treatment, duplex steel, chromoly steel and more steel.

So when a titanium alloy came in today for microstructure, it was a refreshing change and wooo i went to polish it right away.

BAD CHOICE. Turns out, titanium only sounds good. cut myself while grinding it coz titanium is really #$%@# hard to polish. Plus i can’t cut and mount it on a sample holder because they have to examine the etched sample under low magnification.

Speaking about etching. Unlike steels which require nital (3% HNO3 with ethanol), titanium requires the chemical you see in the picture. Now if you have studied chemistry, you’d know that HF (in the pic) is quite ‘fun’.

"HF chemical burns can be treated with a water wash and 2.5% calcium gluconate gel or special rinsing solutions. However, because it is absorbed, medical treatment is necessary; rinsing is not enough. In some cases, amputation is required." (Wikipedia, 2010)

Maybe my chemistry teacher exaggerated quite a bit so when i was handling the etchant, i was wearing 3 pairs of gloves at the same time. It doesn’t help that the rest of the more senior colleagues just retreated to their desks. HAHA.

And then I over-etched the sample. Which means i’d have to do it again. Tomorrow. starting from polishing.