Which steel HT frame?

supersonic

I don't think there are any off the peg steel frames that light (for a medium lets say). Some custom builders may go lower, but flex really starts to become an issue for many riders.

The Spiderman

Cotic Soul is probably the lightest at 4.4lbs.

hoathy

i think my 853 hot is about 1800g

how about this:
http://www.brianrourke.co.uk/rourke-953 ... -1174.html

hoathy

4.4 lbs is about 2kg. i think you can get lighter than that.

supersonic

The Handsome dog is a claimed 4.2lbs, and the Rock Lobster 853 4.25lbs, but the latter is 'from' so will be the smallest size.

Some 90s Konas were 3.9lbs, and Hoathy's is an example of that.

I have seen Road bike frames under 3lbs!!!

blister pus

Last time I spoke to Stuart at Pipedream I asked him what the new medium Sirius was going to come in at and he said 4lbs. I'll be able to verify that when it gets here.

supersonic

Northwind

My old tange prestige-tubed carrera is about 1750 grams. But then it's made of coathangers and built for a short rigid fork, if you stuck a suspension fork in it I imagine it'd bend in half before I got it out of the garage

supersonic

Aye, that is true - one reason why steel frames tend to be havier nowadays.

That Hot is very anorexic!

hoathy

Hey! the hot is awesome to ride!

Mines a '96 and I weight over 17.5 stone, and its still fine.
I am running Fox F80s and its happy with them!

I had knew that the hot was light, but i never considered that it might be one of the lightest production steel frames ever.

The Spiderman

Even more impressive then that the Soul is warrantied to take 140mm forks and meets the new CEN regs.

hoathy

on a scale one to ten, how much do you love the soul?

Northwind

I'd make babies with mine, except that it's a 27.2 seatpost and no matter how hard I try, it won't fit.

ride_whenever

my inbred comes in around 22 lbs, but is sinlge speed with sids 8)

hoathy

impressive, i doubgt mine was ever that light, even when it had a carbon fork and single speed set up.

thelonegroover

Judging by most reputable steel frame makers, I don't think you'll find a frame which you can trust, which comes in under 4 1/4 lb. (1.92 kg)

hoathy

seriously. i have one. i trust it. and i'm a big guy. it exsists. honestly.

heres a lovely picture of it:

Soul Boy

Hoathy,

That Hot is in remarkable condition for its age, sweet.

I came from a P7 and thought that was great (probably a 2003), but my Soul is sooo much better and would rate very highly on the 1-10 scale, in fact might have to raise the scale to 11 just for the Soul

There's just something about the ride, the more you push it the livelier its gets, but in a good way, a really good way.

Sarnian

Well judging by the post on this thread, It looks like I might give soul a try for my next steel build.

hoathy

I have to say, if i were to replace the hot, apart from a new explosif, the soul is the only other frame I would seriously consider, but i'd rather have a soda...

jairaj

Northwind wrote:

I'd make babies with mine, except that it's a 27.2 seatpost and no matter how hard I try, it won't fit.

Im sure you can get a shim to fill in the gap?

Supersonic Any luck getting geometry figures for the Handsome Dog frame?

ride_whenever

has anyone made a 9 series reynolds tube steel frame?

Presumably it would have very poor crash/dent resistance due to being so thin.

jairaj

I've come a across a few custom frame designers that offer it but don't think I've seen any off the self frames.

hoathy

thats not really how it works. 853 and 953 can be made into lighter frames because they have better strength characteristics, so they don't need to be as thick tubed. Just because a frame is made of 953 doens't automatically mean the walls are thinner, and even if they are 953 is stronger than a lot of steels.

supersonic

No news from ATC.

953 is carpenter steel.

Northwind

Genesis did a 953 frame didn't they? More or less for a laugh as far as I can tell.

jairaj wrote:

Im sure you can get a shim to fill in the gap?

It hurts because it's true

ROCHA

Around the year 2000, I believe, Columbus presented a steel tubing called Thermachrom. It had 0.4mm of tube thickness throughout the whole length of the tube, no butted tubes :shock: A mountain bike frame prototype was made by columbus and it weighed 1.3Kg, L size with main tube diameters much bigger than those of Kona steel frames. It was shown at Interbike or something...

The problem was it required a far too complicated heat treatment. Columbus altec2 aluminium alloy tubesets are only sold to companies who can prove they can properly heat treat the frames, but thermacrom was much more difficult and time consuming to heat treat. So, frame prices would probably be much higher than those of carbon fiber frames with equivalent weight. At the same time, aluminium+scandium alloys became relatively affordable and popular(and lightweight too), so that was the end of the story for Thermachrom.
I don't think any company ever produced a significant number of frames using this tubeset. There was a spanish bike manufacturer(BH, if I'm not mistakened) that produced one or two frames out of it and, according to one of their engineers at the time, it weighed less than 1.1Kg, with a single coat of paint.

So, you see, steel frames don't all have to weigh over 4 pounds


A couple of years ago, I bet no one would imagine that a topic discussing steel frames was going to be this popular. 8 pages in 20 days :shock:

supersonic

Dave Hinde produces an alu frame from columbus starship that is perhaps the lightest alu frame on the market. Just over 2lbs

I have seen steel frames well under 3lbs. Very flexy! I have also seen steel mid sections as low as 0.35mm.

You can make a steel frame 3lbs. Can you make it stiff enough though?

ROCHA

In the last post I said:

ROCHA wrote:

There was a spanish bike manufacturer(BH, if I'm not mistakened) that produced one or two frames out of it and, according to one of their engineers at the time, it weighed less than 1.1Kg, with a single coat of paint.

I was mistaken... The frame they produced at the time, wich weighed under 1Kg, was made of aluminum, with some high-tech heat treatment aswell, but not steel.


I still haven't seen any mtb frames made of 953, either. It seems it's hard to cut and to bend(stays) and that Reynolds only supplies it in diameters and thicknesses that are more suitable to road bikes than to mountain bikes. If Reynolds doesn't change this, 953 will continue to be used only on expensive custom built road frames :evil:

hoathy

at the risk of sounding like a broken record:

Hoathy wrote:

how about this:
http://www.brianrourke.co.uk/rourke-953 ... -1174.html