US government low-cost titanium armor program

Government program to get titanium below $10/lb for armor; couldn't break $100/lb. ## Cases mentioned only as one-line references (not developed) - Acetic acid plants — Hastelloy B-3 / zirconium / titanium choice (`§7.p8`). Cluster: "Texas City acetic acid plant zirconium reactors" or "Titanium acetic acid plant hydrogen embrittlement explosion" — both apply marginally. - Platinum-iridium engagement ring made by electron beam melting (`§6.p8`). PROPOSED cluster: "Eagar platinum-iridium engagement ring (personal anecdote)." - Ruthenium BBs for ballpoint pen tips (`§6.p8`). Canonical: "Ruthenium ballpoint pen tip feasibility study." - $300 surgical scissors with cobalt insert (`§7.p2`). Likely linked to the surgical-scissors case from `-6n9y2szRqo §1` but here it's a one-line callback, not a developed treatment. ## Recurring figures (not cases)

Anything else that we ought to — we kind of marched across. Over here, these are low melting alloys. Over here, these are sort of — they're not metals — or they're gases. They tend to be impurities in metals. Cadmium has lots of good properties for corrosion-resistant coatings, but it's got a low vapor pressure, and it's great for silver solders. To go back to my original theme — if we're talking about structural metals, there are only a few of them. Steel, aluminum, some applications of copper, some applications of zinc — lead is, we're trying to get lead out of the world right now — nickel, essential for high temperatures. Magnesium — the hope for the future, has been for the last 50 years and probably will be for the next 30 or 40, in spite of what Adam Powell hopes. Titanium is just too pricey. Takes too much energy to produce it. The US government had a huge program a few years ago to try to make low-cost titanium for armor. But you've got to get it down below ten dollars a pound, and they couldn't do it. It's around a hundred a pound.