Home Sign Up!

Browse Community Submit

All Art Craft Food Games Green Home Kids Life Music Offbeat Outdoors Pets Photo Ride Science Tech

Anodize Titanium!
by goldscott on May 19, 2009 Table of Contents License: Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike (by-nc-sa) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Intro: Anodize Titanium! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 1: Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 2: Get things ready . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 3: Electricity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 4: Apply the Magic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 5: Mask and Paint . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 6: Marvel and Awe and Make Your Friends Jealous . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Related Instructables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Advertisements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Comments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 2 2 3 4 5 5 7 7 8 8

http://www.instructables.com/id/Anodize-Titanium/

License: Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike (by-nc-sa) Intro: Anodize Titanium!

Learn how to anodize titanium at home using only a few simple things that you probably have lying around. I'll walk you through how I anodized my new titanium cyclocross bike.

Image Notes 1. Anodized Titanium!

step 1: Materials
0. Titanium 1. Rubber gloves (to avoid/prevent electrocution) 2. Plastic bowl/bucket/container 3. Small piece of sponge (1 x 1 x 1 cm), or a small piece of cloth (e.g. small strip of towel) 4. Voltage source that can be adjusted from 20-120 V. I used a commercial lab bench supply, but most people don't have these lying around the home. A good solution is to buy twelve 9 V batteries and connect them together in series. This allows you to adjust your voltage in discrete 9 V increments, or you can add a couple smaller voltage batteries in series as well. 5. Alligator clips to connect to your workpiece 6. Comet cleaner (I used this because it is cheap, i.e. less than a dollar), baking soda, TSP (trisodium phosphate), ammonium-phosphate, or Borax. Basically, anything similar to these products. Coca Cola or Pepsi will also work.

We'll be using some simple chemistry and electricity to perform magic!

http://www.instructables.com/id/Anodize-Titanium/

Image Notes 1. Bench top power supply - this one is nice: it has a digital readout

step 2: Get things ready

Fill up your plastic container with a few ounces of water. Pour in about a tablespoon of your cleaning powder. Stir/shake it up a bit. Put your rubber gloves on so you don't electrocute yourself.

Image Notes 1. The magic potion

Image Notes 1. Put these on so you don't electrocute yourself

http://www.instructables.com/id/Anodize-Titanium/

step 3: Electricity
Using the color/voltage chart, connect a few batteries together to get the voltage corresponding to the color you want. Choose a slightly lower voltage (5 to 10 V) to test your voltage/color. I found that my method produces colors about 5 - 10 volts less than this chart (i.e. I got a nice blue at 35 V and pink at 85 V). Or adjust your power supply, if you have one. Important note: once you go up in voltage and add another color (e.g. pink over blue), you can't go back to a color at a lower voltage. However: The anodized layer (an oxide layer, I think) is pretty thin, too, so if you screw up or don't like it down the road, you can put some elbow grease into it and buff it out. Using scotchbrite, high grit sandpaper, or similar will brush/polish your titanium right up. What an amazing element. Connect your alligator clips to the positive and negative terminals of your power supply or battery array.

Image Notes 1. My colors were achieved at voltages 5-10V less than this chart suggests.

Image Notes 1. Connect your batteries in series. Note: you may not need all the batteries to produce the color you want. 2. Connect alligator clips to the "most" negative terminal and "most" positive terminal.

Image Notes

http://www.instructables.com/id/Anodize-Titanium/

1. 35 Volts 2. 85 Volts

step 4: Apply the Magic

Connect the positive electrode (alligator clip) to your piece of titanium. Grab the small piece of sponge with the negative electrode. Try to make sort of a paint brush with it. You may chose to take a precautionary measure and wrap tape around the alligator clip and sponge such that you won't short out your power supply on the titanium. Or ditch the sponge and use a piece of cloth. The object here is to have something that will hold a bit of the water/electrolytic solution that will be "painted" on the titanium.

Image Notes 1. Pretend this is your alligator clip 2. Pretend this is a small piece of sponge. (1 x 1 x 1 cm)

step 5: Mask and Paint

I didn't want all of the titanium colored, so I masked it off with electrical tape. I'm sure most other tapes that won't absorb water will work just fine. You may also choose to clean your titanium to remove fingerprints, dirt, etc. Find an inconspicuous spot on your piece of titanium to test your color. Start with a lower voltage and increase it until you get the color you desire. REMEMBER: you can not get a color at a lower voltage once you've applied a color with a high voltage (e.g. once you get pink at 85 V, you can't get blue at 35 V) "Paint" your titanium! I noticed the colors at the lower voltages seem more stable and consistent. You can see in the pictures that the blue is a nice, consistent, smooth color whereas the pink has a yellow hue to it (yellow comes just before pink when anodizing Ti) and is very splotchy (probably because I didn't clean the frame very well, and because the same voltage wasn't getting to the whole surface evenly).

http://www.instructables.com/id/Anodize-Titanium/

Image Notes 1. Looks lighter in direct light

Image Notes 1. Bad job here: colors are inconsistent because it was difficult to "paint" in this location without removing the crankset.

Image Notes 1. Looks different in the shade vs. direct light

http://www.instructables.com/id/Anodize-Titanium/

step 6: Marvel and Awe and Make Your Friends Jealous

Some feedback from a bike forum I posted this on: "I love you? edit: seriously though that's cool as two dogs " - Nick! "Whoah, that does look real nice though. " - DonPenguino "That looks amazing man." - Mr. Panda "That is really cool!" - sage "I'm gonna cry, that's beautiful. " - Charlie Short

Image Notes 1. Pretty!

Related Instructables

Anodizing Titanium Rings by Thursday

Removing Anodizing From Aluminum Quickly and Easily. by daniel_reetz

Chopper bicycle made from found materials by nemomatic

Make Silver Different Colors by Anodizing (video) by NurdRage

bike rim resurfacing by LED Infinity Mirror, 32 LEDs, Prometheus Selectable Patterns, Quality Frame by ChromationSystems

http://www.instructables.com/id/Anodize-Titanium/

Advertisements

Comments
14 comments Add Comment

mastermakoko says:
so basically i can just use coca cola or pepsi as the anodizing compund?

Jul 5, 2010. 8:05 PM REPLY

goldscott says:
Correct.

Jul 6, 2010. 10:58 AM REPLY

bowmaster says:
Sweet, I'm going to make my titanium spork blue!!

Jun 30, 2010. 2:35 AM REPLY

aero007 says:

Jul 2, 2009. 4:53 PM REPLY dont you have pics of that ?. btw funny i have a brush like that in the picture. about the alu anodizing, i believe using an acid instead of water would work? have you tried using dyes in the electrolyte solution rather than using those voltages ? it seems a high voltage to use ?

goldscott says:

Jul 13, 2009. 10:45 AM REPLY I'm sorry I didn't take pictures of it. I know that aluminum anodizing requires dyes, but titanium anodizing does not. You need these high voltages to anodize titanium. I'm not too knowledgeable about the aluminum anodizing process, but it's dye based instead of voltage dependent.

aero007 says:
could you expand step 4 ? what is the point with the paint brush ?

Jul 2, 2009. 2:01 AM REPLY

goldscott says:

Jul 2, 2009. 11:16 AM REPLY Basically you have a small piece of sponge (soaked in the electrolytic water solution) in the alligator clip (negative electrode), and you use it as a sort of "brush" to "paint" the solution onto the titanium. The titanium will change color when there is electricity passing through the solution.

arirang777 says:
Can we transfer this procedure to Aluminum instead of titanium? Great Instructable by the way

May 27, 2009. 2:12 PM REPLY

goldscott says:

May 28, 2009. 5:02 AM REPLY I doubt this method will work on Aluminum, otherwise more people would be doing it. Here's a good page to get you started on your own: http://www.focuser.com/atm/anodize/anodize.html

westfw says:

May 26, 2009. 12:03 AM REPLY Huh. Last time I attended an anodizing tutorial they were complaining about how hard it was to prep titanium; all sorts of nasty cleansers were involved - but it sounds like you got away with very little cleaning? Neat! BTW, I think I like your "mottled" pink BETTER than a solid, even color on that size of piece. Niobium (aka "columbium") can also be anodized like this. Anodized Aluminum colors are produced with dyes rather than optically-active oxide layers, so even if you CAN anodize aluminum with a similar setup, you won't get colors. A very good reference/supplier is Reactive Metal Studios , although they specialize in jewelry-sized things. Download their catalog; it's good reading!

CameronSS says:
According to Theodore Gray, Diet Pepsi, or any other cola, also works. You just need something with phosphoric acid.

May 19, 2009. 10:56 PM REPLY

goldscott says:
Oh yes, forgot about cola. I'll update the instructible. Thanks!

May 20, 2009. 4:11 AM REPLY

Nerdz says:
Will this technique work with any metal other than Ti? It would be cool to be able to do the same to Aluminum.

May 19, 2009. 9:19 PM REPLY

http://www.instructables.com/id/Anodize-Titanium/

goldscott says:

May 20, 2009. 4:10 AM REPLY It won't work with aluminum, but it may work with other elements in the same column on the periodic table as Ti. But I really don't know; I know very little chemistry. Doesn't hurt to experiment, though.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Anodize-Titanium/