Investigation of elastic properties of single-crystal α-Ti using microcantilever beams

Single-crystal alpha-Ti microcantilevers, with various pre-selected crystal orientations, have been manufactured from a polycrystalline commercially pure Ti sample using a focused ion beam. A nanoindenter was used to conduct microbending tests. Relatively small deflections of similar to 500 nm were used to measure the stiffness of the beams. Young's modulus along the beam's length direction was determined from the measured compliance by means of both simple beam theory and finite-element analysis. The results show that when the effects of flexure at the 'fixed' end were accounted for, by finite-element modelling, the values of Young's modulus were in excellent agreement with available macroscopic data.