Weight/stiffness of new steel bike
- Thread starter Panza
- Start date
On the subject of stainless tubes for bikes.
Fashion seems to have moved away from stainless, or it might have become more difficult to get stainless tubes.
https://www.kvastainless.com/
https://kvastainless.com/order/
https://www.columbus1919.com/en/xcr-en/
https://www.reynoldstechnology.biz/materials/past-materials/s-953-steel/
https://www.reynoldstechnology.biz/materials/steel/s-931/
https://www.reynoldstechnology.biz/materials/steel/steel-921/
https://www.reynoldstechnology.biz/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/rtl_steel_alloys_extract.pdf
Fashion seems to have moved away from stainless, or it might have become more difficult to get stainless tubes.
https://www.kvastainless.com/
https://kvastainless.com/order/
https://www.columbus1919.com/en/xcr-en/
https://www.reynoldstechnology.biz/materials/past-materials/s-953-steel/
https://www.reynoldstechnology.biz/materials/steel/s-931/
https://www.reynoldstechnology.biz/materials/steel/steel-921/
https://www.reynoldstechnology.biz/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/rtl_steel_alloys_extract.pdf
bikeworkshop
Old School Grand Master
Stainless never really made sense imo, as titanium would be superior if you want a hard to weld bare metal frame.
Reynolds did manage to produce a stainless tube with similar properties to the usual steel alloys, but it's much harder to weld,
and has much higher density than ti.
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Botty Kayer
Dirt Disciple
I think the problem with stainless was that the manufacturers insisted on much larger minimum orders that Reynolds simply couldn't do, and so they simply couldn't get hold of it in small batches at a decent price so phased it out.
Think that was from.a few years ago so don't know if thats still the case now, but as raw materials, along with everything else seems to have gone up in recent years, I expect it's still the case.
If you found your ti frame a bit spindly, have a you tried a Columbis Max frame? I'm in the 80-90kg weight range so find the likes of Columbus SL too noodly, but really love a Max frame and especially a Max fork, and have a few. I look for ones that can take 28c tyres in the rear as I find Max and 28c tyres the magic formula for me. The rear is usually the pinch point on the old frames as the Max fork has plenty of clearance.for +30c tyres.
They reintroduced Max in recent years so it's still available for new builds, but you can still find decent 2nd hand ones occasionally for less of an outlay than new obvs.
Think that was from.a few years ago so don't know if thats still the case now, but as raw materials, along with everything else seems to have gone up in recent years, I expect it's still the case.
If you found your ti frame a bit spindly, have a you tried a Columbis Max frame? I'm in the 80-90kg weight range so find the likes of Columbus SL too noodly, but really love a Max frame and especially a Max fork, and have a few. I look for ones that can take 28c tyres in the rear as I find Max and 28c tyres the magic formula for me. The rear is usually the pinch point on the old frames as the Max fork has plenty of clearance.for +30c tyres.
They reintroduced Max in recent years so it's still available for new builds, but you can still find decent 2nd hand ones occasionally for less of an outlay than new obvs.
Last edited:
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