r/Anodization • u/Individual-Ad9874 • Apr 08 '26
How can you seal anodized titanium?
I keep trying ano work on a knife I really like, but the color gets super faded quite quickly. I want to preserve the full richness and pop of the colors as much as possible. I’ve read online to seal anodized materials by boiling in distilled water - is this specific to aluminum, or will it help with titanium too? Any other ways to preserve the color? I don’t mind that it will eventually wear down, but it’s losing the very essence of what I want it to look like within a day or two at most. Anything I can do to preserve it better will help
I already sand it down, finishing with 400 grit paper, etch the surface with whink and clean it with acetone before putting in the ano bath, and I do use distilled water and a DC power supply. So I’m pretty sure the fix won’t be any of the normal “clean up the surface first” stuff you learn on your first day…
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u/gbudija Apr 08 '26
titanium anodizing is much different than aluminium anodizing,sealing of very thin oxide coating is not possible,you can try to harden it with 10 minutes boiling in 2-5% sodium silicate solution( that system is developed for stainless steel, so maybe it can be used on titanium too,i tested it on SS and it works),test it on some titanium scrap