Originally Posted by
rpenmanparker
Would you expect the adhesive bonded joints to be any less secure at a carbon-titanium interface than at an aluminum-aluminum interface? Glued aluminum bikes had lots of faults back in the day, but debonding wasn't one of them as far as I know. The Trek 1000, 1200, 1400, and 2000 were all pretty reliably put together. Same for Vitus and Alan. I know that aluminum-carbon bonds were prone to electrolytic issues, but I would think the titanium-carbon interfaces would be much more inert. And even with the electrolytic issues, am I mistaken, or wasn't aluminum bonded to carbon the construction of the Trek 2300s? What's your take on this in light of the history?
I don't think its knowable without seeing test data. I have concern about boutique companies putting out niche products to carve their fraction of the market. There maybe no R&D predicate for what they create and release to the public. I would feel more comfortable if a company like Specialized, Trek and Cannondale put out such a bike because of PhD material experts and engineers on staff to make these decisions which affect failure versus not.
I personally see no virtue of merging the two materials with the downside of joining two heterogeneous materials versus the benefit to performance. Ti really represents no upside to bike performance....but its a fine material for a bike...I own one and like the bike.