Vacuum Investment Casting :

TITANIUM INVESTMENT CASTING uses lost-wax investment tooling to cast intricate shapes in titanium, zirconium and their alloys. A wax pattern is coated with a refractory slurry, dried and packed in a sand bed. The process resembles conventional lost wax investment casting, but is carried out in high vacuum to prevent oxygen pick-up by the metal. The process is more precise and allows greater shape-complexity than the alternative Rammed Graphite Casting, but it is also more expensive.

Recent refinements of the process and of the Hot Isostatic Pressing that is frequently applied to titanium castings to improve quality now allows the manufacture of critical engine and airframe components of military and commercial aircraft.