Characterization of solutionizing behavior in VT14 titanium alloy using ultrasonic velocity and attenuation measurements

VT14 titanium alloy (Ti–4.5Al–3Mo–1V) was subjected to a series of heat treatments consisting of solutionizing for 1 h at the selected temperatures in range of 923–1323 K at an interval of 50 K, followed by water quenching. Hardness and optical microscopy results are correlated with ultrasonic longitudinal and shear wave velocities and attenuation in these specimens. Ultrasonic velocities and hardness decrease with solution annealing temperature (SAT) in the 923–1123 K range. Beyond 1123 up to 1223 K, they increase slightly. Beyond 1223 K, ultrasonic velocities become constant, whereas hardness increases up to 1323 K. Ultrasonic attenuation exhibits an opposite behavior to velocity and hardness. Further, for the first time, authors have shown that ultrasonic velocity can be used to identify the β-transus temperature in this alloy. Because of non-monotonous variation of velocity and attenuation with solutionizing temperature, it was not possible to identify the SAT using any one of these parameters. Hence, a new parameter, ratio of normalized differential of ultrasonic attenuation to normalized differential of ultrasonic velocity (RNDAV) has been used, which is found to increase monotonously with SAT and hence enabling unambiguous characterization of SAT in solution annealed VT14 alloy.