What do TA titanium alloy, TB titanium alloy, and TC titanium alloy mean?
Aug 12, 2025
Titanium is an allotrope with a melting point of 1668°C. Below 882°C, it adopts a close-packed hexagonal lattice structure, known as α titanium; above 882°C, it adopts a body-centered cubic lattice structure, known as β titanium. By utilizing the different characteristics of these two titanium structures and adding appropriate alloying elements, the phase transition temperature and phase fraction are gradually altered, resulting in titanium alloys with different microstructures. At room temperature, titanium alloys have three matrix structures, resulting in three categories: α alloys, (α+β) alloys, and β alloys. In China, these are designated as TA, TC, and TB, respectively.
α titanium alloy
This is a single-phase alloy composed of an α-phase solid solution. It remains in the α phase at both ambient and higher application temperatures. Its structure is stable, its wear resistance exceeds that of pure titanium, and its oxidation resistance is strong. It maintains its strength and creep resistance at temperatures between 500°C and 600°C, but cannot be heat-treated and its room-temperature strength is low. β-Titanium Alloy
This single-phase alloy, composed of a β-phase solid solution, exhibits high strength even without heat treatment. Quenching and aging further strengthen the alloy, achieving room-temperature strengths of 1372-1666 MPa. However, its thermal stability is poor, making it unsuitable for use at high temperatures.
α+β-Titanium Alloy
This dual-phase alloy exhibits excellent overall properties, including good structural stability, toughness, ductility, and high-temperature deformation resistance. It can be readily processed by hot presses and strengthened by quenching and aging. The heat-treated strength is approximately 50%-100% higher than the annealed state. It also exhibits high high-temperature strength and can operate for extended periods at temperatures of 400°C-500°C. Its thermal stability is inferior to that of α-Titanium Alloy.
Of the three titanium alloys, α-Titanium Alloy and α+β-Titanium Alloy are the most commonly used. α-Titanium Alloy has the best machinability, followed by α+β-Titanium Alloy, and β-Titanium Alloy has the worst. The designations for α-Titanium Alloy are TA, β-Titanium Alloy are TB, and α+β-Titanium Alloy are TC. Titanium alloys can be categorized by application into heat-resistant alloys, high-strength alloys, corrosion-resistant alloys (such as titanium-molybdenum and titanium-palladium alloys), low-temperature alloys, and special-purpose alloys (such as titanium-iron hydrogen storage materials and titanium-nickel shape memory alloys).
Heat Treatment: Titanium alloys can be modified to achieve different phase compositions and microstructures by adjusting the heat treatment process. It is generally believed that a fine equiaxed structure exhibits superior plasticity, thermal stability, and fatigue strength; an acicular structure exhibits higher endurance strength, creep strength, and fracture toughness; and a mixed equiaxed and acicular structure exhibits better overall properties.
New Titanium Alloys
New titanium alloys consist of a mixture of two titanium crystals, called α-titanium and β-titanium phases, each corresponding to a specific atomic arrangement. Oxygen and iron are the two most powerful stabilizers and strengtheners of the α-titanium and β-titanium phases, and they are abundant and inexpensive.
The company boasts leading domestic titanium processing production lines, including:
German-imported precision titanium tube production line (annual production capacity: 30,000 tons);
Japanese-technology titanium foil rolling line (thinnest to 6μm);
Fully automated titanium rod continuous extrusion line;
Intelligent titanium plate and strip finishing mill;
The MES system enables digital control and management of the entire production process, achieving product dimensional accuracy of ±0.01μm.
