Titanium's unique properties make it an excellent choice for a wedding band, although it's very different than gold or platinum. It’s a very lightweight metal, almost like aluminum, weighing only 1/3 as much as gold! Many people prefer this light feel because they hardly notice they are wearing a titanium ring at all! Its grayish color is close to white, but a few shades darker than platinum and white gold, more like the color of stainless steel, or gun-metal gray.
Titanium is often marketed as being scratch-resistant, but our experience shows that with normal wear, titanium wedding bands will quickly begin to show small scrapes and scratches just like gold and platinum wedding bands. Although titanium is a very hard and durable metal, it can still be scratched by abrasive materials like rocks, sandpaper, and even hardened steel tools and utensils. The good news is that any jeweler in your area should be able to make your titanium ring look new again with a little polishing. Titanium rings look great and have a nice shine when they have been polished! Due to the incredible strength and durability of titanium, it is difficult to cut and shape compared to gold, silver and platinum. Because of this unique nature, re-sizing these rings is nearly impossible; therefore, great care must be taken when sizing your finger. It is possible to slightly increase a titanium ring's size by removing a small amount of material from the inside surface, but it isn't possible to make it smaller.
Titanium is not a rare or precious metal, it is readily available to those who want to use it in any industry. Most of the cost in making a titanium ring is in the skilled labor to craft the ring from such a hard metal. All of our titanium wedding rings are made from high grade aircraft titanium to provide our customers the highest quality. Titanium rings are constructed from solid bars of titanium, which results in a perfectly seamless ring. Titanium will not irritate or discolor your skin and will not harm the body in any way. Titanium is used in the medical and dental fields in surgical implants, bone screws, hip replacements, heart valves and more. Titanium rings are superior in durability to precious metals such as gold, silver and platinum (as you might guess from its uses in the aerospace and medical fields). A Titanium ring may long outlive the wearer.
Black Titanium Wedding Bands: What is Black Titanium?
Natural titanium is grayish in color and, when alloyed with specific metals to increase its strength, has recently become a popular choice for wedding bands. The light weight of titanium and the grayish color appeals to many people, as well as the incredible strength and hypoallergenic properties. Under carefully controlled manufacturing conditions and using a special titanium alloy, the exterior surface color of naturally gray titanium wedding bands can be permanently changed to a rich and luxurious black. This color is not a paint or coating that is applied to outside surface after the wedding band is finished, but it actually forms on the titanium wedding band during part of the manufacturing and treatment process.
The proprietary alloy needed to achieve this great look is used exclusively by the Spectore Corporation and is trademarked as Black-Ti™ . Several other manufacturers have tried to produce comparable black titanium wedding bands, but have had poor results. We have tested some of those products and found that the black color is only on the surface and eventually scratches off, revealing the gray titanium underneath. Our Black-Ti™ titanium wedding bands are the only true black titanium wedding bands that are impervious to typical wear and scratching and are guaranteed to stay black forever.
Can a Titanium ring be cut off?
Yes! Please be aware that in any situation where it might become necessary to cut off a Titanium ring - for instance excessive weight gain, hand injury, etc., - cutting through titanium will be more difficult than cutting through gold or platinum. However, it can still be done. In our own jewelry shop, we used a separating disc and flexible shaft tool-items commonly found in nearly all jewelry shops that work with gold, silver, and platinum--to cut through one of our 5mm domed and comfort fit titanium rings. Cutting it all the way through took only 20 seconds. Next, we contacted our local hospital emergency room and asked if they were equipped to cut off a titanium ring in an emergency. Most hospital emergency rooms are prepared to handle almost anything, and ours assured us that it would be no problem for them.
During our 30+ years of jewelry repair experience, we've only seen a dozen or so rings that have been cut off in hospital emergency rooms, and in most of those cases the rings had been bent out-of-round and were putting painful pressure on the finger. Titanium rings are less likely to crush or bend out-of-round, so if you shut your hand in a car door or drop a heavy object on it, it might be safer to be wearing a titanium ring than a precious metal band! Nonetheless, if you ever need your Titanium ring cut off, just contact a local jeweler that uses separating discs. Please check with your local medical facility if you have concerns.
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