Titanium aluminide intermetallic compound has a high specific stiffness close to 40 GPa/g•cm3, the maximum allowed under the regulations. The material also has high temperature strength and its use in the cylinder head valves of Formula One engines has contributed to achieving higher engine speed. Vacuum annealing has been developed to try to enhance fracture toughness, and a technique has been established to prevent products with micro-cracks from being shipped if they occur during processing, by optimizing eddy current inspection technology to overcome quality issues.
Article of Honda R&D Technical Review F1 Special (The third Era Activities) (254 - 256)