A COMPARISON BETWEEN THE CORROSION BEHAVIOR OF SINTERED AND UNSINTERED POROUS TITANIUM

Corrosion tests were performed on sintered and unsintered titanium por ous compacts of various porosities, as well as on solid titanium which acted as a control material. The tests were conducted in 0.9% aqueous NaCl solution maintained at 37 degrees C to simulate the physiologica l environment encountered by surgical implants in the human body. The results confirm that solid titanium and sintered porous titanium both possess a distinct passivation range. Unsintered porous titanium does not seem to passivate al all and suffers greater corrosion than solid titanium. Unsintered specimens compacted at higher pressures experienc ed more corrosion than those compacted at lower pressures, although si ntered specimens behaved in the exact opposite fashion. An explanation is given in the paper for these phenomena.