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Titanium used to be used almost exclusively in military applications (aircraft, missiles, spacecraft), but in recent years it has become cheaper and more widely used. I imagine this has something to do with the opening up of supplies from the former USSR, which has much of the world's titanium supply. I have examples of titanium golf clubs, titanium crowbar, etc.
Unfortunately not everything sold under the "titanium" name actually contains titanium metal. The name has come to be associated with strength and quality, and marketers sometimes like to be associated with it whether their particular product actually contains it or not. See below for several examples of "titanium" products I have tested and found wanting, as well as examples of real titanium products.
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Cylinder, Sponge, and Mossy, 99.98%.
Kindly donated by David Franco, who sent many elements after seeing the slashdot discussion.
Source: David Franco
Contributor: David Franco
Acquired: 17 May, 2002
Price: Donated
Size: 0.1"
Purity: 99.98%
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 Machined part, 99.999%.
This lovely if perplexing shape of "five nines" titanium was kindly donated by Ivan Petrov, of the Materials Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois. I had gone there to have my artificial knee joint sample tested to see what it was. It turned out to be Aluminum instead of the hoped for titanium. I guess he took pity on me by donating a couple of nice pure metals.
Source: Ivan Petrov
Contributor: Ivan Petrov
Acquired: 6 June, 2002
Price: Donated
Size: 3"
Purity: 99.999%
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Electrochemically grown crystals.
These crystals were reported to have been grown in a factory some time ago. I don't know much more about them, but they are heavy, shiny, and titanium-like. A few are about an inch long, the rest crumbled.
Source: eBay seller snooj
Contributor: Theodore Gray
Acquired: 11 June, 2002
Price: $13
Size: 1"
Purity: >99%
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 Intramedullary nails.
Paul Wellin's brother is an orthopedic surgeon. I know this because I was talking to Paul about how I hoped some day to meet an orthopedic surgeon who would have some left over body parts made out of titanium or tantalum that he could donate to my periodic table, upon which Paul said....
These bone pins were defective in some way, though they look rather pretty to me. They are over twelve inches long. Think about someone cutting open your body, drilling out the marrow of your bones and the ramming one of these things the whole length through, so they can screw some fittings on either end. Ouch. But at least you'll have some very attractive titanium in you from then on.
Paul Wellin's Brother sent the following information about these samples:
"Titanium has become a preferred material for Orthopedic implants over the past 10-15 years because of a number of its inherent properties. It is inert in the body, and has sufficient strength to support the mechanical loads (assuming proper design and size of the implant). It is also very resistant to fatigue failure - that is, it can undergo many (millions) of cycles of mechanical loading without failure - a property that is extremely important in an Orthopedic implant that will be subjected to a million cycles of loading a year. Most Orthopedic titanium implants are actually an alloy of titanium with small amounts of aluminum and vanadium, as pure titanium implants are somewhat brittle and have a higher rate of fracture. Titanium alloy is less brittle, and holds up quite well."
"As to why the implants you have are not in someone's body, they are not defective; they were actually in the operating room and taken out of their sterile packaging in anticipation of being implanted, but were for one reason or another not used. In some cases, the devices were implanted, but found to be too long or too short, and were then replaced with a correct sized implant. We are not allowed to re-use devices that have been implanted and removed, as there is no feasible way to ensure that the stresses of implantation have not altered the mechanical properties of the device. So they become very expensive junk. (Any implant that was removed from a patient was thoroughly cleaned and then sterilized before it left the OR). Other devices may have been removed from their packaging, but not implanted because the surgeon changed his/her mind about the size or decided to use a slightly different implant before actually putting in the patient. Depending on the implant, re-sterilization in the hospital may not be practicable - more expensive junk."
"These intramedullary rods or nails are placed inside the intramedullary canal (marrow cavity) of long bones like the femur or tibia to stabilize fractures of these bones until they heal."
Source: Paul Wellin
Contributor: Paul Wellin
Acquired: 14 June, 2002
Price: Donated
Size: 12"
Purity: >95%
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Hip joint socket.
This is the other half of an artificial hip joint you can see under cobalt, the socket into which the ball from that part fits into. The outer surface is a wonderful matrix of sintered titanium balls (very small), for the hip bone to grow into, firmly attaching the socket to the bone.
Source: Paul Wellin
Contributor: Paul Wellin
Acquired: 14 June, 2002
Price: Donated
Size: 2.25"
Purity: >95%
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Gibraltar Millennium Coin.
I have a feeling this is one of those coins that isn't actually meant to be spent. Its face value is 5 Gibraltar Pounds, whatever that's worth. I paid $35 for it. It's one of only a very small number of coins that's ever been minted out of titanium, probably because the stuff is pretty hard to work with, and most people wouldn't appreciate the advantages of coinage you could build a jet engine out of.
Dan Lewis, the source of this coin, sent the following story about it:The titanium coins were minted for Gibraltar by the Pobjoy Mint in the UK. Only 2001 of them were produced, and I think they have kind of given up on making more titanium coins because the hardness of the metal makes it very difficult to work with, not to mention how quickly it destroys the dies. They did issue one other Five Pound coin in the year 2000, this one to commemorate the famous "Tuppenny Blue" postage stamp, which is currently valued at $800,000. I think they were already committed to minting the second coin before they figured out what a pain it would be to produce coins from titanium. The contrast in weight between this coin and my similarly-sized niobium coin is dramatic.
Analysis by x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy at the Center for Microanalysis of Materials, University of Illinois (partially supported by the U.S. Department of Energy under grant DEFG02-91-ER45439) indicates that the coin is essentially pure titanium.
Source: Dan Lewis
Contributor: Theodore Gray
Acquired: 14 June, 2002
Price: $35
Size: 1.5"
Purity: >99%
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Strange lump.
Ed Pegg found this strange-looking lump of metal/crystal in some sand when he was 6 years old, and has managed to keep it for 33 years through about 20 moves. He never knew what it was until I took it in for analysis by x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy at the Center for Microanalysis of Materials, University of Illinois (partially supported by the U.S. Department of Energy under grant DEFG02-91-ER45439).
You'll never guess what it is: I was certainly quite surprised to find out and so was Ed. It is a mixture of 62% iron and 38% titanium (!). Since he found it near an air force base in Florida, it's almost certainly some kind of alien space metal that fell off a truck transporting a crashed flying saucer to the secret lab at the air force base.
Either that or Ed should go back to where he found it and become fabulously wealthy after staking a titanium mining claim.
Source: Ed Pegg Jr
Contributor: Ed Pegg Jr
Acquired: 18 December, 2002
Price: Donated
Size: 1"
Purity: 38%
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So-called TITANIUM watch.
After the experience with Chris' "TITANIUM" racquetball racket. which turned out to contain not even the slightest trace of titanium, I'm suspicious of any inexpensive object claiming to be made of titanium. At $7 (after Christmas clearance), this watch was definitely inexpensive. But it did say titanium prominently on the box, and for the time being I'll give it the benefit of the doubt. After I test it and know for sure whether there is any titanium involved, I'll publish the details.
Source: Hardware Store
Contributor: Theodore Gray
Acquired: 3 January, 2003
Price: $7
Size: 2"
Purity: 90%
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Sample from the Everest Element Set.
Up until the early 1990's a company in Russia sold a periodic table collection with element samples. At some point their American distributor sold off the remaining stock to a man who is now selling them on eBay. The samples (excepted gasses) weight about 0.25 grams each, and the whole set comes in a very nice wooden box with a printed periodic table in the lid.
To learn more about the set you can visit my page about element collecting for a general description and information about how to buy one, or you can see photographs of all the samples from the set displayed on my website in a periodic table layout or with bigger pictures in numerical order.
Source: Rob Accurso
Contributor: Rob Accurso
Acquired: 7 February, 2003
Price: Donated
Size: 0.2"
Purity: >99%
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Aircraft bolts.
You know you're not dealing with everyday bolts when they arrive with an individual protective sleeve on each one, to protect the threads from the other titanium bolts I suppose. Since these bolts are very expensive they are used only where weight is critical, and my guess is that the dimple in the head is there to reduce the weight just a bit more by removing material that doesn't really contribute to the strength. Titanium really is very light, and you would never mistake these for common steel bolts.
The seller claims they retail for about $30 each, and I'm not going to argue with that because it makes them seem more exotic and interesting, and it makes me feel better about having paid about $3 each for a 7/16-20 stove bolt.
Analysis by x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy at the Center for Microanalysis of Materials, University of Illinois (partially supported by the U.S. Department of Energy under grant DEFG02-91-ER45439) confirms that they are high-purity titanium metal.
Source: eBay seller getnick
Contributor: Theodore Gray
Acquired: 22 February, 2003
Price: $14.50/5
Size: 2.5"
Purity: >95%
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Crowbar.
Why would anyone want a titanium crowbar? In my case because we have a projector screen with a handle that's hard to reach. It's located near the periodic table, and the only logical place to put something to hook the handle with is on my element shelf, but I don't allow anything on my element shelf that isn't an element sample. I didn't see any alternative really.
Why anyone else would want a titanium crowbar is less clear. It is very light, which I suppose might be nice, but then often you really want some weight behind your crowbar, when you're jamming it in or under something. I suppose it's nice that it will never rust, but I haven't really had that problem with my half dozen other crowbars. (Including the one I found in my wife's tire after she ran over it. Funny how the construction workers at the building site there didn't make any attempt to claim it as theirs, even though any reasonable person would assume it must have been them who left it out in the middle of the road.)
My big problem with a titanium crowbar is that I'd be afraid to use it for fear of scratching the silky smooth finish. I also wonder how they can be made so cheaply, considering how expensive other things made of titanium are. I'll have to test it to make sure it isn't just an aluminum alloy with some titanium in it.
Source: Dutchguard
Contributor: Theodore Gray
Acquired: 22 February, 2003
Price: $40
Size: 22"
Purity: >90%
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Padlock.
This padlock is sold as a "Titanium Series" rustproof, high security pad lock. It took me about two minutes to drill the rivets out and open it, but I admit that was using a drill press and a special-grade very hard drill bit.
Unfortunately, the term "Titanium" is used in some sort of poetic sense unrelated to the metallurgical composition of the lock. The cladding around the padlock is, according to analysis by x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy at the Center for Microanalysis of Materials, University of Illinois (partially supported by the U.S. Department of Energy under grant DEFG02-91-ER45439), ordinary stainless steel (i.e. mostly iron with nickel and chromium added to inhibit rust). There is no titanium whatsoever in this padlock. On the plus side, the stainless steel is probably stronger than titanium would be, at least at the sorts of temperatures the lock is likely to experience.
Source: Hardware Store
Contributor: Theodore Gray
Acquired: 26 February, 2003
Price: $12
Size: 3"
Purity: >90%
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Wick holders.
I wasn't exactly sure what a "wick holder" was, but it was described as something used on large aircraft and made out of titanium: That's good enough for me, and the price was right. I think they hold some kind of wire that dissipates static electricity on the trailing edge of a wing.
Source: eBay seller getnick
Contributor: Theodore Gray
Acquired: 27 February, 2003
Price: $13/10
Size: 3"
Purity: >95%
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Golf club.
Considering the number of items that claim to be made of titanium but are not, I bought this cheap golf club purely on speculation. I would have been perfectly happy to report that it was yet another titanium fraud, but actually analysis by x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy at the Center for Microanalysis of Materials, University of Illinois (partially supported by the U.S. Department of Energy under grant DEFG02-91-ER45439) indicates that it is virtually pure titanium! Score one for cut-rate discount golf clubs at SAMS Club.
Source: Walmart
Contributor: Theodore Gray
Acquired: 10 March, 2003
Price: $20
Size: 5"
Purity: >99%
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