This unusual beast popped up in my Google newsfeed & I wondered whether folk here might be interested. It's 8 grand of titanium e-bike & the frame is jointed & glued together.
ALAN and Vitus both done bonded aluminium aswell.
There are also plenty of carbon tube metal lugged frames glued together aswell.
Its a pretty tried a tested method.
Also LOOK (carbon tubes bonded to alu lugs) around 30 years ago.
We have a trek road bike with main carbon fibre tubes bonded to aluminium stays and lugs.
I had a Trek hybrid made in the same way with aluminium tubes.
there’s a rayleigh dynatech in my loft which was bonded titanium… its 30 years old. its not been ridden in 10 yrs but looks to still be solid
I've got a 1993 Raleigh M-Trax made in a similar way, the three main tubes are titanium and the rest, including the BB shell, headtube etc is cro-mo.
I had heard that Raleigh bought a load of titanium cheap from the Russian navy after the soviet union collapsed but then discovered that it was too pure to weld and so had to glue it together with steel lugs.
Anyway, they developed a reputation for the tubes popping out but mine is still going strong. 3x7 LX, cantis, 1 1/8" threaded steerer, biopace chainring, all the cool stuff
Trek used to bond aluminium and steel frames on ‘Investment cast lugs’. That was back right at the start of the 90’s.
I’ve got a 1993 Raleigh M-Trax made in a similar way, the three main tubes are titanium and the rest, including the BB shell, headtube etc is cro-mo.
I had heard that Raleigh bought a load of titanium cheap from the Russian navy after the soviet union collapsed but then discovered that it was too pure to weld and so had to glue it together with steel lugs.
Anyway, they developed a reputation for the tubes popping out but mine is still going strong. 3×7 LX, cantis, 1 1/8″ threaded steerer, biopace chainring, all the cool stuff
I had the dynatec diablo LX. First frame did develop a bulge at one of the joint. Replacement was ok but got stolen. M Trax from the insurance payout was nowhere near as good. Less ti...but that got stolen too...as did it's replacement.
I had a DX Dyna-tech with Al tubes. I remember it as being actually OK tho' the Spinner rigid forks were incredibly heavy.
I guess glue is a good way around the achilles heel of cheap Ti which is the welds between the tubes