Originally Posted by Nessism

Ride quality depends on flex at least as much as material damping. Steel for example, doesn't damp very well but many people laud the ride quality because the typical steel frame, made with small diameter tubes, flexes in response to road inputs. Aluminum on the other hand, is a more flexible material than steel but because of fatigue related concerns, the typical Al frame is designed to reduce flexing in order to preserve frame life. Bottom line is that trying to measure frame characteristics would be relatively meaningless unless the testers are prepared to measure many many variables to quantify the various differences between all the frames given both design and material considerations. Good luck with that.