Big fan of titanium although don't have a titanium bike but I do feel it is the best material for frames and many other components of a bike. Fuji-ta the world's largest bike manufacturer by a huge margin and dominating aluminium frame sales and produce a huge number of robot welded steel frames plus also a very significant player in carbon frame production for brands like Cannondale, GT, Raleigh etc actually seem to have a preference for titanium or at least are honest about the material properties.


Titanium Bike Frame - Tianjin Fuji-ta Bicycle Co.,Ltd.

I feel the chart is a little unfair to titanium weight though as it used to be stated that titanium was about equal in weight to a high quality aluminium frame or lower end carbon frame. However maybe their chart is true for their specific frames as they are at the forefront of aluminium and carbon frame technology.

The weird thing about titanium frames or parts is their complete lack of needing to be painted so its often easy to restore the finish to as new by polishing, the only other material that can look as new for decades is stainless steel. Also having great resistance to fatigue more so than even Steel means a very long life frame. Where as carbon frames are breaking frequently and hitting landfill its nice to see a material that not only produces a very long life, durable product but is easily recycled at end of life. Great for the environment just like cycling in general.

Creating butted titanium tubes is an expensive process so many titanium tubes are straight gauge for cost reasons. Doesn't seem to affect ride quality but clearly you sacrifice a weight advantage if you don't use butted tubes.

I guess my point is titanium is a fantastic material that seems to be out of favour due to carbon producing lighter frames and parts nowadays but for me far, far superior to carbon.

Seems an ideal material for a folding bike but I don't know of any mass market models at reasonable prices either currently or in the past. Today you get decent entry level titanium road and mountain bikes perhaps £1,200 here in the UK but no folding bike at similar prices.