What do you think of titanium enclosures?

KR Sound said:
I’ve always wanted to try anodizing and think certain colors would look really cool. I’m surprised it’s not prevalent. Even the black finish like in AR parts or cerakote.
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Reason it’s not common in pedals is that anodizing doesn’t look very good on the very crude cast aluminum that most enclosures are made from. Folded sheet aluminum on the other hand anodized beautifully, which is why strymon pedals among others are all anodized
 
I don't really know anything about working with metal, but how about stainless steel? Or does it just look similar to polished aluminum, but maybe harder to work with?

I think wooden faceplates are also something that have been done, but there's probably still room to play around with those. Not sure if there are any durability issues.
 
A lot of the titanium in the planet came from decommissioned Russian nuclear submarines. If you're buying from a surplus site, be sure to test it with your Geiger counter....!!! A friend of mine used to be into refurbishing military equipment, and he'd always take his when looking to buy. All the military equipment used at A-bomb test sites in the 50's fell into the cracks!!!
 
Have you ever worked with titanium before? even the thin stuff if tougher than shit, if you don’t have a real break I wouldn’t even try, the stuff you would probably be able to bend will be so thin that oil-canning might be an issue, but on a lighter note it makes a pretty white spark with you cut it.
 
Paradox916 said:
Have you ever worked with titanium before? even the thin stuff if tougher than shit, if you don’t have a real break I wouldn’t even try, the stuff you would probably be able to bend will be so thin that oil-canning might be an issue, but on a lighter note it makes a pretty white spark with you cut it.
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Never ever worked with it before. White spark? Is it the heat reacting to the titanium?
 
Paradox916 said:
I’m talking about using a cutting wheel, once again unless you have good equipment you aren’t cutting it any other way, a harbor freight shear isn’t going to do it.
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Yeah in my head i was thinking they cut it with a water jet or something.
 
steviejr92 said:
Yeah in my head i was thinking they cut it with a water jet or something.
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Diamond is harder than titanium. You have to lubricate and cool it with water with a bit of anti-freeze in it to keep the diamonds from overheating. I have a felker diamond tile saw, that sucker goes through *anything*
 
There's a lot of zinc in the diecast boxes we use - they're not solid aluminium. Plus as Bricksnbeatles says cast aluminium doesn't anodise well. You want rolled aluminium to anodise.

Sheet stainless steel could work but it is a PITA to get tooling marks out of and is expensive.

I agree with Mr Sheep.
 
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