Influence of thermo-mechanical processing on microstructure, mechanical properties and corrosion behavior of a new metastable β-titanium biomedical alloy

Abstract

This paper presents the results on the influence of different thermo-mechanical processing (TMP) on the mechanical properties and electrochemical behavior of new metastable β-alloy Ti-20.6Nb-13.6Zr-0.5V (TNZV). TMP included hot working in below β-transus, solution heat treatments at same temperature in different cooling rates in addition to aging. Depending upon the TMP conditions, a wide range of microstructures with varying spatial distributions and morphologies of equiaxed/elongated α, β phases were attained, allowing for a wide range of mechanical and electrochemical properties to be achieved. The corrosion behavior of studied alloy was evaluated in Ringer's solution at 37°C using open-circuit potential-time and potentiodynamic polarization measurements.