Titanium Industry Pioneer Passes

Stanley Abkowitz, an award-winning pioneer in the U.S. titanium metals industry and the founder of Dynamet Technology Inc. (Burlington, MA), died on October 29 at the age of 90. A 1948 graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) who was trained as a metallurgist, he quite literally helped to establish the American titanium industry through his work on developing Ti-6Al-4V, the widely used alloy that has shaped numerous aerospace, industrial and commercial designs and applications. In essence, his work marked the coming of age of titanium’s promise as the wonder metal.

During the early 1950s, as a member of the Watertown (MA) Arsenal, an Army research center for titanium, his titanium/aluminum/vanadium alloy was hailed as a major breakthrough with strategic military significance for the U.S. This was the era when Cold War tensions dominated the world order. In those early years, titanium production was ramped up for the production of the Lockheed U2 spy plane that was introduced in the mid-1950s, flew at a dizzying altitude of 70,000 ft, and monitored military installations in the Soviet Union.

The May 17, 1954 edition of the The New York Times carried an article titled “Titanium Studies Bring New Alloy; Light Material Developed by Army Reported as Tough as High-Strength Steel, which stated, “. . . laboratory tests showed the alloy to be 40 percent lighter in weight than high-strength steel. However, it is highly corrosion resistant and has properties that compare favorably with those of steel used in making heavy weapons, tanks and armor plate. The alloy was worked out by Stanley Abkowitz, a member of the arsenal’s laboratory staff who was serving as a technical supervisor of a contract with the Armour Research Foundation of Chicago. The foundation is one of many agencies engaged in titanium research for the arsenal under government contract.”

Abkowitz went on to publish the first technical paper on the Ti-6Al-4V alloy on June 10, 1954, unveiled during a technical symposium held at Columbia University. One year later he published “Titanium in Industry,” the first book to document the emergence of the young titanium business. In 1999, also wrote a monograph titled “The Emergence of the Titanium Industry.”

In 1972, Abkowitz founded Dynamet Technology and focused on the development of titanium powder metallurgy. In June 2014, RTI International Metals Inc. (Pittsburgh, PA) acquired Dynamet and one year later aluminum giant Alcoa purchased RTI. The International Titanium Association (ITA; Northglenn, CO) lauded his distinguished career by acknowledging him in 2000 as the first recipient of their prestigious Titanium Lifetime Achievement Award. He also won their 2013 Applications Development Award for his work that marked a new era for the use of titanium powder metal technology in the aerospace industry.

In 2005, ASM International (originally known as the American Society for Metals), awarded Abkowitz with their Lifetime Achievement Award. A 1972 ASM Fellow, Abkowitz also received the William Hunt Eisenman Award in 1999. He held 24 patents and authored 60 papers and articles on titanium technology.

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