I remember a sale on those Litespeed Sabers on some website. I hemmed and hawed until my size was gone. Was bummed until I stumbled upon this one on that popular online auction site. I know of one other "on the road"...pretty sure they made less than ten of these.

I've got a saber in a storage shed.....I should get it out, or sell it! It's an old Lynskey built one that is beautiful!

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Gary Geiger
http://www.geigerphoto.com Professional photographer

TEAM KiWAMi NORTH AMERICA http://www.kiwamitri.com, Rudy Project http://www.rudyprojectusa.com, GU https://guenergy.com/shop/ ; Salming World Ambassador; https://www.shopsalming.com

I'm curious how the cost of a titanium welder and frame materials compares to the labor, facility and materials to make a carbon frame? How much is the markup on a carbon frame and how do you know? I suspect Lynskey and Parlee are similar in terms of bicycle production volume. Do you think Parlee invests more on marketing?

Titanium has some mystique surrounding it that suggests it is a superlative material but almost nothing about its physical properties would indicate that the argument for it has merit.

When you assign a value to a product beyond its ability to execute its function I can see the emotional attachment. Of course Made in America trumps all for many as well.

-SD

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https://www.kickstarter.com/...bike-for-the-new-era

So why are hip replacements, mars vehicles, combat aircraft (A10) and fan blades in jet engines made out of ti instead carbon?

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I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time like tears in rain.

That is one very fine litespeed

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http://stuartwalpole.blogspot.com/

Hi Frank,

Hips, etc. have different demands from bike frames. And fighter jets use a lot of carbon fibre as well as ti.

I worked for a few years at an aerospace company that worked a lot of ti. Cold section fan blades, access sandwich panels, superplastic formed sheet parts, chemically milled engine rings, etc. Fabricating ti is very very fun, cool, high tech and exciting (from my perspective). We were worried carbon would replace ti for fan blades, and a few engines had them, but erosion was a challenge. Bike frames don't suffer from erosion.

Before that, I worked for a short time at a custom ti frame builder. With welding done on site, the shop attracted broken ti frames of all brands. They broke in the same way and in the same places as steel frames broke. Ti isn't magic in that sense.

Instead, I believe the right material for each application gives the best performance. For bike frames, ti is great if you travel a lot (no paint to scratch, can always be buffed to look good). It's not so great if you care about getting the last bit of performance out of your ride. Top performance requires aero, stiffness, weight and comfort. (In fact we even arranged the Engineering section of our web site into those categories.)

Right now, carbon is hard to beat for performance.

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Damon Rinard
Engineering Manager,
CSG Road Engineering Department
Cannondale & GT Bicycles
(ex-Cervelo, ex-Trek, ex-Velomax, ex-Kestrel)

Hi Damon,

I understood Dave's posting as a defeatism of ti in general not just bike frames.

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I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time like tears in rain.

As beautiful as it it 16.6 lbs jsut can't right. I'd rather suppose with all the heavy stuff (DA cranks, Adamo saddle, Q-Rings, bottle cages and top tube bag) it's around 18-19.0 lbs. BTW: The one below is right at 20.0 lbs.

Hy Frank, I wouldn't waste time arguing with people either working for or affiliated with companies producing carbon fiber frames - it's their job to promote carbon carbon fiber. It seems like they should be nervous these days. Material much better for frame tubing than carbon fiber was discovered - http://www.calfeedesign.com/products/bamboo/. And this material is available almost for free in countries where mass production carbon frames are usually built. Cervelos & Treks (not mentioning Felt) should catch up or they will run out of business soon :) I doubt any carbon frame would survive a crash I had a few month ago when a passing van hit my handlebars when I was going 25+ mph. My commute bike Roo Ti-phoon seems to hit ground very hard according to broken seat and multiple damages. The frame survived and I made 30 miles back home. So I'll stick with titanium - material I trust....

Hello easy-rider and All,

http://www.hollandcycles.com/

ExoGrid ti and carbon fiber combo .....................

ExoGrid® technology combines the best attributes of advanced composites with those of traditional metals.
A Holland ExoGrid® frame starts with a titanium tube that has a major portion of the surface area removed through advanced laser machining. The distinct pattern of multiple small laser-cut diamonds is unique to Holland ExoGrid® tubing. We believe the better torsional stiffness, improved durability and structural reliability of our ExoGrid® frames justify the significantly higher laser-cutting and labor costs incurred in the tube manufacture.




Carbon Seat Stays
We can build your Holland frame with carbon seat stays if you want added vibration damping at this critical juncture. In the event of a mishap, carbon seat stays can be replaced easily, a considerable contrast to a molded carbon frame suffering the same mishap.



Bike in a box

Cheers,

Neal

+1 mph Faster

I'm almost done with mine, not as nice as some on here, but here it is almost finished without race setup:

Looks like I'm reviving an old thread.
I'm a brand new member to ST, but a long time browser. I did a few triathlons about 7 years ago then had to take a break (2 daughters, surgeries...).
I had a Cervelo Soloist Team with clip-on aerobars that I sold. I found this used 2008 Guru Merus in Jan 2017 and updated cockpit and drivetrain. Also gave it a Wedgie. Now I'm getting ready for he Malibu Triathlon (classic distance) in about a month.

You can't argue with the above. The "no paint to scratch" line is more important than a lot of people give credit for. As a road/training bike I still ride my old Litespeed Vortex. The performance is certainly a notch or two below a nice carbon aero bike, but the bike is 12 year old now, has seen lots of use in all conditions, and with 5 minutes effort looks brand spanking new.

Every carbon bike I have seen that has gotten similar hard use just starts to look a little worn and ratty. Road dirt, grit and gravel takes its toll. There is certainly no performance impact, but I bet more bikes are replaced for that reason ("it just looks old") than any other. Ti bikes really can last a lifetime AND look new - about the only way I would claim they are superior to carbon.

I just can't justify spending for a new bike when my Litespeed still looks so new. Also for training the external cable routing and BB makes maintenance super easy.

If I raced on it it would be a different story.

Twin downtubes. My roadbike since 1996 has been a Colnago Bi-Titanio, an early Colnago experiment with Ti. Had the twin downtubes ultimately turned out to be the most efficient design, they'd have caught on, but they are an eye-catcher.

I was out riding with the local roadies yesterday. Must have been 100 people in the twin paceline. I hit a big-ass pothole. After collecting my water bottles and trying to get my bars back to the angle they'd been, the group was long long gone. The morning turned into a hard slog. Apparently I wasn't nearly as recovered as I'd thought. I stopped to refill water bottles and that's when I found the problem. The pothole had shifted my rear wheel so the tire had spent the last 2hrs rubbing paint off of a chainstay. I'd been so incredibly careful with the fabulous complicated Colnago paint job these many years, and I'd finally screwed it up with a big abrasion mark inside of a chainstay. Shit.

Sure, there's lots of newer technology, lighter bikes out there, and because of downtube braze-ons, electronic shifting will never suit the bike.

I've never had much of a bond with any of the 4 dedicated tri-bikes I've ever had. Somehow tho, the Colnago is different. We're tight.

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Books @ Amazon
"If only he had used his genius for niceness, instead of Evil." M. Smart

You just have to ride one. I have a 2000 Litespeed Palmares and it just floats over the road and flies up the climbs. I've had a few steel frames and hate them compared to Ti. Try riding on a chip seal road with a steel frame and you will need to visit the dentist. Same road with a Ti frame and you will forget why you hated that road before. Carbon on the other hand can be as comfortable as Ti but at the cost of durability. My Tarmac for example was just as comfortable but one minor crash and it was toast. My Litepeed survived 2 major crashes with just a few scuffs. I get that the direction is now toward Carbon, but at the current prices, they should give you 5 of them so you can just throw them away after each incident. Kind of like disposable contact lenses.

I've had the opportunity to own a few ti frames over the years, Merin, Litespeed, and a Bontrager. I've also had the opportunity to study the nature and source of compliance on a bicycle and develop products that have the intention of being stiff and those that are intended to be comfortable. Titanium really doesn't check any of those boxes. Titanium frame failures are abundant. If the market demanded a bicycle frame survive a crash I'd put my money on a 1.5kg carbon frame before a 1.5kg titanium one.

-SD

I guess like everything, it's model and design dependent. A friend of mine had a Litespeed Ghisallo and it was like riding a wet noodle. The Palmares though, was a more aero, stiff version of the Vortex and it is a great frame.

As far as surviving crashes, why would you put any money on a carbon frame surviving a crash at all let alone over a quality Ti Frame? Carbon may be a great material for creating a frame with custom qualities (shape, localized stiffness), but I rate durability at 0. No exaggeration. I went down in low speed crash and it cracked the seat stay. A friend of mine had a similar minor crash and cracked his seat tube. In contrast, I had a high speed crash with impact against a metal pole where I broke my femur (in half) and the Litespeed hit the pole directly with just minor scuffing. For durability, Litespeed > S-Sworks Tarmac. I know you put weight into the equation, but I'd gladly pay the extra kg price to not have to replace my frame after every minor crash.

If there were enough other consumers that shared your buying habits you'd see ballistic grade composite bicycle frames. There aren't. But since we're throwing out anecdotes as evidence I crash on my carbon groad bike just about every ride, sometimes spectacularly. I've crashed on my track bike more than I care to admit as well. Both those bikes are going strong and the results I've earned or frame qualities developed with them would not have been possible with titanium.

Anecdote to you, but reality for me. I'd be happy to send you a copy of my x-ray. Still got my litespeed and a bonus titanium plate in my leg. Crash replacement for my Tarmac. I do like the Tarmac, but I am a realist. I don't expect it to last long. As a consumer, it does play into my future purchases. For example, I won't buy another S-works over a Pro model. I'll save the difference and apply it to my next crash replacement.

Sweet Jesus, you two need to spend less time on the ground.

Not a great photo here, but I found this titanium Guru frame in a broke-down bike recycle shop, fashioned it together with some carbon parts and have been riding for years (20 events?). Not sure about the wind-tunnel or crash-test data, but it's nice having a bike among 2,000 that no one else has ...