Titanium frames, whats all the fuss about ?

Parkwood

Never ridden one but always wondered what the fuss is bout with Ti hard tail MTB frames,

The Rookie

Titanium has as a similar benefit to steel in being easy to create a more compliant frame than with aluminium (it's not impossible with aluminium alloys, but harder) additionally both steel and titanium have a higher internal hysteresis so it adds an eminent of damping so it doesn't 'Spring back' like almunium alloy. The benefit of Ti over steel is of course weight, a Ti frame will be lighter than steel and lighter than most aluminium alloy frames, though not lighter than a decent carbin fibre frame.

cooldad

And is a bugger to weld unless you are pretty expert, plus it will crack, inevitably.

Looks pretty though.

Parkwood

The frame that on one do looks nice, right money too and a 10 year guarantee to boot

rockmonkeysc

cooldad wrote:

And is a bugger to weld unless you are pretty expert, plus it will crack, inevitably.

Looks pretty though.

It's not that hard to weld. Horrible stuff to machine though.

Parkwood

Why will it crack ??

Just checked out the weight difference compared to my current Parkwood frame 1900g for the parkwood and 1545g for the Ti frame. Not a massive difference when you consider the price differnce

supersonic

I have seen a lot of failed ti frames at the welds - if they get contaminated they tend to crack. Shouldn't really happen these days, especially involving the cost, but it does.

The cost rules them out for me. I can get carbon frames for less than half the price that are lighter, and can be stiffer and stronger (or flexier if needs be) - if they fail, repairing is easier too.

Parkwood

I can't ever see myself having a carbon frame, I've heard loads of horror stories about them snapping/cracking. How can they be repaired ? surely once the weave has been compromised its pretty much scrap ?

BloggingFit

Knowledge and tech applying carbon fibre for bike frame applications now has vastly improved in the past 4 - 5 years to the point where the failure rates would be no worse than aluminium or steel frames.

There will always be cheap, inferior options available that you would do well to steer clear of but even these are getting pretty good now.

I've owned carbon bikes for the past 3 years and so far without issue.

rockmonkeysc

The worst carbon frames I have seen for failure are surprisingly Specialized. I've seen two 2015 Stumpjumpers fail, one cracked the full length of the downtube in a fairly minor fall. A demo which split all the way around the bottom bracket and a Enduro 29er which cracked around the top shock mount.

supersonic

Some expert frame repairers out there - I have seen tubes torn in two from crashes/car accidents and repaired, and guaranteed to be the same strength and ride characteristics as before.

http://www.carbonbiketechnics.co.uk/

rockmonkeysc

Ti frames are far from solid.

The Rookie

Titanium seems far better suited to road bikes, many of them are lasting 20+ years, mountain bikes seem to crack far to often and aren't then cheap to repair, if I wanted a non carbon/Aluminium frame I'd probably get a Pace or Cotic steel.

eric_draven

The Rookie wrote:

Titanium seems far better suited to road bikes, many of them are lasting 20+ years, mountain bikes seem to crack far to often and aren't then cheap to repair, if I wanted a non carbon/Aluminium frame I'd probably get a Pace or Cotic steel.

I have a Cotic Solaris can't say enough about it,i had been years since i had ridden a steel frame,i had forgotten how nice they were to ride
I have repaired a few steel frames with a Tig welder been a fabricator for 25+ years, but they have a tendency to crack next to where you have welded it,it just becomes a weak spot,was asked to reweld a headtube weld on an Orange Patriot some years back that had cracked,but flatly refused as it would of pulled out of alignment and put stresses in other areas of the frame,plus I knew the guy was going to get it re-powder coated and flog it on ebay to some unsuspecting buyer

would like to have a go at welding titanium,can't see it being much different to stainless steel

rockmonkeysc

Ti is very different to stainless to weld. Pre heat is fairly critical, so is using the correct gas and getting flow rate spot on.
Did you stress relieve the steel frames you welded? That's the usual reason welds fail, the HAZ around the weld will be much harder and more brittle than the parent metal.