Given equal conditions, which frame material holds up best over the years?
 

Assuming normal wear and tear - no excessive rain riding or snow riding, proper storage, etc. - which frame material holds up the best over the years?

I ask because it seems to me that a nice road bike frame could potentially stay nice for a lifetime, even with heavy use. I have a steel frame that I like. I keep upgrading the parts, but if I don't want to upgrade the frame ever, is there a compelling reason to? There is no rust on the frame. There is a big dent, but that shouldn't matter with steel.

But the same should go for cf frames, aluminum, ti, etc. Do frames ever get "wear and tear?" Shouldn't we all be able to just invest in a frame we like and just replace wearable parts and upgrade components if necessary, but leave the frame - the "core" of the bike - unchanged?

First person to call this a troll question wins. But the question is serious. I'm doing some major upgrades to bike and just was wondering if I there is any reason I should just buy a whole new one instead.

Reynolds 953.

Ti.

Your remarks may well be seen as a flagrant and aggravated troll by some, but who cares . . . it is what it is . . . you can do this with metal.

What prize shall we award to the first person to retort that "all frame materials can fail"?

Steel or Titanium. Seen lots of damaged steel that is still more than usable, but haven't seen any damaged titanium.

Again, Reynolds 953.

/thread.

With any steel, wouldn't the risk of gradual degradation (rust) be more likely than other materials?

today i rode my steel bike that i converted to single speed after i got the carbon frame. it is still such a fun ride. clearly less comfy than the carbon but still fun and responsive. i'll never get rid of it.

Actually I suppose carbon assuming you don't crash it. Won't rust or corrode..

Steel, so long as it doesn't rust.

Titanium develops stress fractures over time due to it being very rigid. This is why titanium aircraft have to be meticulously maintained.

Aluminum is pound-for-pound stronger than steel, but I think any given steel bike frame would be stronger with steel, with the same design.

Carbon... well, it's stronger than steel but very, very brittle. It also doesn't corrode, so I guess as long as the resin doesn't degrade, and you don't have any serious impacts, the carbon could feasibly last longer than steel. But if you don't crash a bike once in a while, you're not going fast enough :D

Steel has proven itself time and time again as being the most durable and most economical material with which to build bicycles frames and parts... because of a nearly infinite fatigue life under normal conditions a well protected steel frame will outlast generations of riders.

Aluminium does not have the same fatigue life and like carbon, fails catastrophically when it hit's it's limits. Most would not choose a carbon frame for day to day usage over the long term due to it's vulnerability to damage but as a rather economical high performance material none can compare.

Lightweight carbon bikes are also less expensive to produce than comparable steel bicycles... you can build a steel framed bicycle to exceed UCI limits but you will need really deep pockets to do so.

Titanium is probably the best material out there if you are looking for strength, lightness, corrosion resistance, and an infinite service life but it is prohibitively expensive.

Determining the best has to incorporate a lot of different factors and if I was building a lifetime bike I would probably settle on steel because of the cost vs performance aspect... Reynold's 953 is amazing stuff but requires special skills for fabrication.

I have one Al bike that just turned 10 and it has seen tens of thousands of really hard miles and is solid as it was on day 1 but also have steel bikes that date back to the 30's and 40's that are still going strong.

is steel considered economical? i thought new steel is really expensive boutique stuff now.

I think some guy named Mike at Performancenashbardirectbike sells a lot of inexpensive steelies.

shill. we haven't had one of those threads for absolutely ages. you'd have thought winter would be the time for those stupid threads.

Thing here is not the weight, but the specific gravity of the respective materials as this effects the practical limits of tube sizes that can be used.

Aluminium is only 1/3 as stiff as steel, 1/2 as strong, and 1/3 the weight as a similar volume of steel. This is why aluminium frames need oversized tubes with thicker walls to match the strength of a 1 inch steel tube while still saving some weight.

Titanium is as strong as steel at half the weight but due to a lower specific gravity building a titanium frame to the same specs as a steel frame would give you a very noodly frame since it is not as stiff... this is why Ti tubes are slightly oversized as a larger tube is a stronger / stiffer tube and slightly thinner walls can be used to reduce weight.

At best you are going to save about a pound if you use aluminium or Titanium instead of steel and for most riders this isn't anything they will notice.

If you push the gin soaked old geezer off his bike in Soho you can own one of those old limey built steel Raleighs.

Troll. I win.

From my inexperienced point of view, I'll vote steel. Particularly Reynolds 953.

so does this mean that you have to get a $3k-4k frame in order to have the strength, lightness, corrosion resistance, and service life that you have described? what about regular 3V-2.5Al frames such as the lynskey 200 & 300 series?

Why would anyone say any type of steel holds up better than Ti? Just because Titanium doesn't rust.

Or is there something different about 953 from other tubing in that respect?

Also, I really don't think Ti is prohibitively expensive when you can buy perfectly high quality complete bikes from BD for $2000-$2700 with Ultegra or Dura Ace. Those road frames are from the same factory as my Motobecane Fly Ti MTB, and that bike looks like it came out of the Litespeed factory. VERY impressive indeed. If my Ibis Ti Road ever gives up the ghost, I'd probably replace it with one of those.

But the Ibis Ti probably won't ever crack or break. It's 15 years old now, God only knows how many miles. 40,000 or more. Love that bike, it has sentimental value, and as long as it's not broken I'd keep it and/or re-finish it again in the future. Fantastic bicycle.

It is probably a good time to invest in that Lynskey... their prices are probably as low as they will ever be as the price of Ti has dropped a great deal and we are also in a recession which tends to motivate manufacturers to cut folks a much better deal.

The R230 frame w/ carbon fork is selling for $1999.00 and their Cooper frameset is selling for 1500.00... those are very good prices as a few years ago Ti prices were off the scale and I know of a few companies that actually had to discontinue and delay some production because of this.

In comparison my rather exceptional steel hardtail was $1000.00 (frame only) so when well made Ti frames are approaching that of steel you know the price is good.

We were talking about what would last the longest in a nice environment and diverged a little into costs... I think that Ti would be the best bet in even the harshest of environments as you really would not have to take any special precautions to protect the frame.

The fatigue life of steel and Ti might as well be considered indefinite in cycling applications while aluminium does have a finite fatigue life.

Ti. Even if it does break alot of the companys who make Ti frames give a lifetime guarentee.

Yes, 953 is stainless steel and extremely corrosion resistant.

To OP, I think any rider looking to get the most return on their frame investment needs to look at how they ride and maintain their bike and where they live (climate, road conditions) and take their best guess on what makes sense. "Equal conditions" can mean a lot of different things and when you are talking about how a frame is going to hold up 10+ years out the small differences like bumpy roads (fatigue) and relative humidity (rust) can make the difference. Do a search here and you will find plenty of stories and pics of failed frames of all types.

953 is maraging steel--it's an alloy (stainless) therefore does not rust like regular steel.

It also has a tensile strength of 1750 to 2050MPa, over twice that of Ti.
http://www.strongframes.com/blog/wp-...s/953-FAQs.pdf
http://asm.matweb.com/search/Specifi...bassnum=MTP641

So you have a bike that is twice is strong as Ti, can be made with lighter tubes than Ti, has the ride characteristics of regular steel yet stiffer when accelerating, cheaper than Ti (prices from IF website), etc.

953 is still new and that's why many people don't know about it yet. I've never seen a bike with 953 tubing in person; that makes sense though when CF is the marketed high-end material of choice right now.

I don't think Titanium prices are headed back to where they were. Not to say the bike makers won't raise their prices ;).