Dear Ajeet Babu Kumar Parasumanna ,

I woudl suggest that DSC is more appropriate to study the kinetics of phase transformations in Al alloys than dilatometry. For Ti alloys the beta-alpha transformation is very important as a function of cooling/quenching rates. This transformation implies important changes in specific volume and hence dilatometric variations. Thus for the kinetic study of the phase transformations in Ti alloys dilatometry can be a very valuable tool. It is noted that an integrated approach based on different analysis techniques is often desirable in order to get full insights. For Al alloys lattice parameter determinations as a function of heat treatment may yield valuable results.

Dear Ajeet Babu Kumar Parasumanna,

See also reference below:

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/P_Mourik/publications?pubType=thesis

Dear Ajeet Babu Kumar Parasumanna,

I agree with Pieter. Dilatometry is very helpful for recording CCT diagrams of several materials. However, as we already discussed, for Al alloys DSC is the technique of choice. In any case DSC is more sensitve compared to dilatometry.

To get a little insight why you need to combine several DSC devices to get a full physical understanding I recoomend to go through the folowing publications (all available in my profile):

Milkereit B, Kessler O, Schick C. Recording of continuous cooling precipitation diagrams of aluminium alloys, Thermochim. Acta 492 (2009) 73-78.

Milkereit B, Wanderka N, Schick C, Kessler O. Continuous cooling precipitation diagrams of Al-Mg-Si alloys, Mater. Sci. Eng. A 550 (2012) 87-96.

Schumacher P, Pogatscher S, Starink MJ, Schick C, Mohles V, Milkereit B. Quench-induced precipitates in Al-Si alloys: Calorimetric determination of solute content and characterisation of microstructure, Thermochimica Acta 602 (2015) 63-73.

Regards,

Benjamin

Depending on the aims of your studies it is possible to implement some dilatometry for understanding the titanium alloys behaviour during heat treatment. But the volume (linear) effect of the phase transformations in titanium alloys is much smaller than in case of steels. Furthermore, sometimes it is necessary to obtain transformations in the partially transformed phase, so the linear effect would be even smaller than it is expected. Moreover, for the grain refinement in titanium alloys (to increase some properties) you need to apply a deformation and transformations in the deformed state differ from the transformations in the undeformed state.

DSC (DTA) or even simple thermal analysis are suitable to obtain the time-temperature intervals of the heat emission or capture, which are associated with the phase transformations. But it is not easy to obtain using DSC (DTA) the same cooling rates as implemented in the quenching dilatometer.

It is possible to conduct simple thermal analysis using quenching or even deformation dilatometer, but this method is not standardized and it still remains so-called "the state of art".

So I am not sure, that standalone dilatometry or DSC (DTA) are almost suitable for the industrial production studies of titanium alloys, because of the reasons mentioned above. Hope that my thoughts would be useful for you.

Dilatometers are only capable of observing those phase changes which are associated with a significant expansion or contraction of the solid, or a significant change in the coefficient of thermal expansion. There are certain types of subtle phase transitions that are not observable via dilatometry - GP zone transitions in aluminum alloys come to mind, for example. 

Utmost sensitivity would be achieved with a 3D DSC - but for large heat effect phase changes, a planar DSC would also be sufficient. 

uptade of my answer from July 2015,

during the last month we did a lot of work on testing the possibilities and limits of dilatometry for the detection of solid-solid phase transformations in Al alloys.

Basically dilatometry can help in this field, particularly for higher concentrated 2xxx and 7xxx alloy. If you chose a proper measurement setup, dialotometry can detect precipitation and dissolution for some alloys.

For more details please check this publication (full text available in my list of contributions on researchgate):

Detection of Quench Induced Precipitation in Al Alloys by Dilatometry

B. Milkereit, M. Reich, O. Kessle;  DOI: 10.4028/www.scientific.net/MSF.877.147

Conference: 15th International Conference on Aluminum Alloys, June 12-16, 2016, At Chongqing, China, Volume: 877

comments & feedback welcome

Best Regards,

Benjamin

already one and half a year out of date, but still:

if you bought it, you can use it for similar applications like the DSC

I have been using it few years for analysis of 6xxx during continous cooling or artificial aging (CCT´s, TTT´s) and used both quenching and conventional dilatometer for estimation of the precipitate type in conventional alloys and as well for SPD aluminium alloys (a great help here btw.)

most of it is not published, since I´m quite lazy, so here is a link to the part of my dissertation, dealing with it https://ulozto.cz/!vSNkFZwJno9G/dizp-part-pdf

feel free to use it :)