pattrick

Looking for a bike to ride some of the local back roads and some of the local trails. The roads are in mediocre condition at best. Often the patches are worse than the potholes creating a series of mogul type bumps, think major washboard . Some of the trails are hard pack clay and the others are either hard packed limestone or slag. The trails are easily doable with 32mm tires and I am currently using these for the trails and the roads as they seem a good compromise. I was considering the GT Carbon, Grade 105, but I ran across the Habenero site. The thought of Ti has an appeal to me as far as durability and ti's ability to supposedly mute road vibration. Just curious if anyone here has any experience with this brand and the cross/ tour bike in particular. All opinions appreciated.

mtn_cyclist

I have this bike (a couple years old) and love it.
Save Up To 60% Off Titanium Cyclocross Bicycles | Road Bikes - Motobecane Fantom Cross Team Titanium | Cross Bikes

Marcus_Ti

Ti has several neat properties which make it a great pick for unpavement (doesn't rust, not too heavy, and is quite durable in tubing and in finish). There are a few options in the lower-price Ti frame market...depending on what you're wanting.

A few things that gave me pause when doing my Ti Unpavement bike (see here for my Titanium Unpavement build log), that led me to not go to Habanero...Habanero for disc brakes does not spec thru-axles, ew—no (they don't list the option, but their site doesn't look like its been updated since 2005). Secondly, while the geometry is a decent-yet-aggressive "gravel grinder" geometry--it is not a CX geometry (too low a BB) by any means nor is it a touring geometry (to short a chainstay and too aggressive)....sure you can go custom-but 12-16 weeks for delivery from now is most of the riding season. Also the fork selection for a build kit is pretty meh.


It depends on what you want out of the bike. Also your budget.

ksryder

Some guy I rode next to for a few seconds at the Dirty Kanza a couple years ago liked his.

That's my valuable input lol.

pattrick

Thank you gentleman for the responses. I was hoping for a bit more, the lack of feed back has me feeling I may want to hold off and investigate my options further. Ti just seems to appeal to me now. I am thinking a three to four thousand budget max but cheaper is always good too. mtncyclist that price on the Phantom sounds way under priced I guess I have a lot more homework to do.

mtn_cyclist

I have one. Nicely welded frame,lots of Ultegra. Underpriced?? Well....okay, I'm sure you can find something more expensive.

ksryder

Bikesdirect bikes are fine and can be a pretty good value but you should be prepared to service hubs/headset/BB & true/tension wheels before you head out.

That said, I bought a nashbar bike a couple years ago & while it was also a good value, in the end after replacing/upgrading virtually everything to make it better & more usable I'd have been better off buying a nicer complete bike in the first place. I wouldn't do it again.

Marcus_Ti

Best advice....do an Excel spreadsheet for a build. Figure EVERYTHING out. What wheels you want and how/who is building them. What transmission, crankset, bottom bracket, brakes, Post, stem, handlebars, bar tape, tires, tubes, rim tape, lighting, computer mount. ALL of it. Something you'll certainly have an opinion about-like what transmission groupset you want (speed and tier). If you want discs, you'll want thru-axles dropouts. For $4,000 with some sales you could probably swing 105 or Ultegra disc with handbuilt Bitex hubs.

For example:



Then you know what your budget is for the frame and fork and headset. Lynskey has complete builds for #3400ish (105 with mech disc brakes) and up (Ultegra mech with hydraulics $4400 for example), plus shipping.

https://lynskeyperformance.com/2017-gr-250-complete/


Which depending on your fancy, and your luck with hitting sales, you might be able to do much better than. My Di2 hydraulic Carver gravel grinder build came out to $4700 fully ready to ride with cages/pannier racks/all (including $125 in LBS labor), thanks to sales spread through out Xmas-spring. There's the above mentioned Bikes Direct

TimothyH

I saw a Litespeed T5G today. Two actually. Super nice bike.

There is a second one behind the Orbea MTB. One of them was Di2. I think the Di2 bike was over $5K and I'm not sure about the mechanical version.

What's interesting is that this is the premier triathlon shop in Atlanta, or maybe the whole Southeast. They have titanium gravel bikes on display right next to $10K tri bikes so you know the sport is getting big.

pattrick

The Lynskey GR 250 looks interesting. Just wondering how going down to 32mm tires would effect the ride. They state the ride was designed for 42mm tires. Just hate not being able to see or test ride these things

Marcus_Ti

A 30-something would accelerate better...but would be less confident on looser-pack and damp/wet non-pavement. Also the smaller tire would lower the BB to the ground a bit more making the bike ride more stable-which might be a good thing (offroad and offroad-high speed rec riding) or a bad thing (as for steering quickness and maneuverability in a race) depending on what you are doing.


A 40mm(+ IRL) GravelKing is a bit of a tank when accelerating, but holds speed better once moving.



Since you have an interest in touring....ask Lynskey about the rack mounts on the backend and what rack they recommend for it. If they still sell that bike as pictured, the mounts can result in higher-center-of-gravity and spacing problems to the saddle depending on the rack. Which is the problem with those Wright dropouts-IIRC the Lynskey Backroad touring machine uses more standard rack positions.

pattrick

No interest in touring really just looking for a ti bike which will run 32mm well. Bike will need to run both roads and well maintained rail to trail type formats. I am 56 years old so comfort is king. My racing days are over! Budget has wiggle room everywhere but once again custom seems a stretch for my needs. Money is not a major influence but face it I am looking for the most bang for my buck. Manufacture is not an issue , I have no loyalty to anyone. I have an old 2000 Litespeed Tuscany with a full Campy group that I had enjoyed, it currently just sits in my garage. Just an older gentleman looking to pick up a sweet ride. I had cycled quite a bit till this time and then life got in the way. As my father used to say "I just have more money than brains". Not necessarily a bad place to be. While I may enjoy riding and would like to get back into it, my knowledge ,I am quite sure is far less than a great deal of you fine folks here which is why I tend to ask such general type questions. I apologize for being so unclear of my wants or needs but I am basically just looking for a great roadie capable of running 32mm tires.

Wittyname

Hmm? Ti? Clearance for 32s? Endurance geometry? 4k budget? I'll just leave this here...



In all seriousness, check them out. I've got a couple of their bikes and they've just been fantastic, I'm planning on getting another one later this year (don't tell my wife!)

NoGears

Carver.

Ti Gravel Grinder - Carver Bikes

If comfort is king and you're riding nasty roads...you don't want 32c tires. I wouldn't even consider anything less than 35c and since going to a 40c....probably won't ever go smaller than that.

92Esquire

The problem with Ti is that no one stocks it. In several years of looking, I've seen exactly one Ti bike in my size (58 - 59cm TT) in a shop and that was a Litespeed T5G (was a very nice bike, convinced me I wanted Ti). I wanted something similar to what you are looking for (relaxed geo road frame that would take 32c).

I've got one shop that will order a Moots and build it up, but they weren't crazy about the idea. I have a couple local shops that sold (and subsequently dropped) Lynskey. One shop stocks a good number of the Salsa drop bars, but never the Ti frames. Another shop sells Kona, but only the lower-end frames. That Foundry looks amazing, FWIW.

So I did what any midlife-crisis sufferer would do. I blew my budget out of the water and put down a deposit on a Seven.

One thing to be mindful of is axles. I've read enough about road bikes with disc to know I wanted thru-axles if I had disc brakes. That starts limiting your fork choices quickly - even more so when you specify 32c tires. I had originally thought to get my Seven with the ENVE Road Disc fork for thru-axle, but Seven has talked me into considering the ENVE GRD fork instead. Few other road geo disc forks out there.

With Ti, you're kind of either taking the plunge and mail ordering it, or settling for what you can get locally in Carbon or Al unfortunately.

Wittyname

This is the big problem, really; it's a niche within a niche. I've found exactly 1 store that carries a variety of titanium bikes, and unfortunately they're 1100 miles away (shout out to the awesome guys at Mad Duck Cyclery in Grapevine TX, keep doin' what you're doing!) I love how ti rides, wish more people had the chance to give it a try