titanium frame care tips
 

i picked up a good condition older titanium road frame and have a few questions before i invest too much into it:

1- what lube/anti seize to use when installing the seat post, headset, bottom bracket?

2- much of my experience is with bmx bikes. something stiff and a hammer is how i usually remove a headset. what sort of at home diy methods can be used to remove the old headset?

3- bottom bracket seems stuck. i didnt want to muscle it too much for fear of damaging the frame or threads. any suggestions?

4- some people describe ti as indestructible or very strong but i actually feel like this frame material is very delicate and im afraid my manhandling and bunnyhopping might be too much abuse. lets be honest, its a road frame which wasnt designed or intended for such activities, but ive given a fair amount of abuse to older lugged steel frames which have held up reasonably well. should i stick with the old steel or give the ti a run?

thanks.

I'd go with a graphite base, primarily because I have a bucket of it. Ti is quite corrosion resistant, but I don't know what it can get up to in terms of galling.

I'd might put a bit of more effort into how I support the frame, but otherwise the same would do. A more elegant solution is of course the flared tube approach.
Headsets with aluminum cups can get badly chewed up by hammer disassembly.

Cup & cone BBs will either be fairly tight from assembly, or have the thread orientation where riding it will screw it in tighter. They can be a beast to remove no matter what. First tip is:
- Make Sure You're Turning It In The Right Direction
Apart from that, www.sheldonbrown.com has a bunch of useful hints on how to deal with a stubborn BB.

The main thing here is that Ti is a different material, it's not just steel scaled up. Among other things it'll stretch more than steel for the same load, and early on the tube sizes available were limited. These two together contributes to Ti frames often having a very different feel to them than to steel frames.
If it's a somewhat later frame there's a sort of proportionality between material cost and the allowed design cost. If you're paying top dollar for the material, you're not going to accept any clunky old design for the layout.

As far as manhandling goes I can't imagine a Ti frame not being able to withstand a strong rider honking it up long climbs, so I'd assume you're safe there. Bunnyhopping can't be much worse than hitting a pothole at speed, which is something just about every bike would have to survive, so I'd assume you're safe there too. My guess ist that (depending on rider weight) you're OK unless you try to hang with the CX/MTB crowd.

Bunnyhopping on a road bike is more likely to trash the wheels than the frame. You shouldn't do it too often unless you like replacing spokes.

Nickle based anti-seize it what is normally used on titanium in the machining world.Ti is reactive and will cold weld with alot of materials.