First Ride: Titan Cycles Titanium Belt Drive Fixed Gear

[bironi]

Funky looking finish, love the head badge. Should look good all dressed up.

[exapkib]

I'm so interested in seeing how this builds up.

Refreshing (and inspiring) to see the unique creations you've come up with. I've always been drawn to the belt drive, and hope to implement something like this for my commuter someday.

(Which reminds me--did you find a buyer for the belt-drive Cannondale?)

[MaraudingWalrus]

Originally Posted by exapkib

(Which reminds me--did you find a buyer for the belt-drive Cannondale?)

I did. Local guy here who I'd actually sold a set of wheels to picked it up.

[exapkib]

Originally Posted by MaraudingWalrus

I did. Local guy here who I'd actually sold a set of wheels to picked it up.

Glad to hear it--that one called to me more than once. If things come together (as I hope) to pursue a similar 'customization' project in the future I'll definitely reach out for your advice and experience.

[MaraudingWalrus]

Got it as together as I think I'm going to for a couple days. Have that sram hydro rim brake arriving Tuesday and Thursday the rest of the belt drive bits should be here.

[sokyroadie]

Nice frame, but why not a larger size since it was custom?

Just curious, not being critical.

[MaraudingWalrus]

Originally Posted by sokyroadie

Nice frame, but why not a larger size since it was custom?



Just curious, not being critical.

I think I am the only person in the universe who likes the look of compact frame geometry/sloping top tube. And head tube is actually quite monstrous as it is. I hope to ride a bunch this summer and get a bit fitter than where I currently am and bring the bars down to just about a five mil spacer under the stem.

[MaraudingWalrus]

Got in the brake I'm going to use.

Sram Hydraulic rim brake. Will take off the shift lever part of it when I get around to it.


Anybody have a lever body laying around for the right? Shifter and brake parts need not work.


Belt drive parts maybe showing up Thursday? Should have it out on the road Sunday morning!

[MaraudingWalrus]

Originally Posted by spinarelli

Jeff Jones was on this podcast and had a few interesting things to say about manufacturing Titanium in Asia, Taiwan especially. Worth listening to.

https://www.behindthehandlebarspodca...es-jones-bikes

A very interesting listen! I always am frustrated by the idea that simply because something was made in place X it is better than something else, ignoring all other things about it. Place of origin, quality, and price are all things that matter to anyone buying a thing. If you imagine them as sliders each person has their own mix that works best for them. An inexpensive thing made well somewhere else is preferable to me than an equally well made thing made "here" for multiple times the price.

obviously everyone has their own amount that place of origin matters. nobody is right or wrong as it's their own widget, not anyone else's.







Also grabbed a SRAM rival hydro rim brake rear setup for $100 to use for the right hand of this bike; will gut the lever and remove the brake.

[MaraudingWalrus]

The world's most expensive dummy lever?had to resist temptation to buy a "nicer" one than Rival. Just going to take the lever blades off and disconnect the brake hose for the right side of the fixed gear - and if I ever put it back together for use on a geared bike, I can get Red or Force lever blades.

[fa63]

Happy to see that front hub found a very nice home!

[MaraudingWalrus]

Have it built up. Shakedown ride tomorrow. Will tape the bars tonight and swap out to the Enve pads before the ride tomorrow.

Will be taking the required tools for adjusting some fit with me, obviously. I'd forgotten how long the reach on the hydro levers is compared to others not sure what implications that'll have for my stem length in the future.


Looking forward to it.

[MaraudingWalrus]

got a chance to ride the bike today. Took it for a short ride (15miles) on a new rail to trail system that opened up here recently that I hadn't yet been on.







I swapped out the post to one of my straight posts, which played nicer with the monstrous reach of the levers. We'll see how that feels for a couple weeks of riding.





The bike rides very well. It's super stable and not as twitchy as lots of fixed gear bikes I've ridden and owned. Riding no handed it does stay very straight - it didn't take a significant amount of "getting used to" like a couple of bikes with super quick steering that I've ridden.



It does seem to ride like what I had intended, which is a road bike in the vein of a Cannondale Synapse (from which I loosely stole the geometry) that happens to be fixed gear, rather than a track bike. Also I have no toe overlap, which is nice.



The ride was mostly on a rail trail which is nearly dead straight, so I don't really know how it corners at speed, but my few cornering events seemed nice enough. Bottom bracket is reasonably high, so I'm not terrified of striking a pedal.





The hydro rim brake is pretty nice, and it's also very silly - which I'm obviously all about.





Will ride again tomorrow with a few more corners on a road I've ridden millions of times, so it'll be nice to compare it to the tens of thousands of miles of other riding I've done on that road.





Haven't ridden much in the last year, let alone much riding fixed, so I know I'll feel it in my legs by this afternoon.

[MaraudingWalrus]

Took the shift paddles out of the shifters, but actually left the shift internals inside the lever, as removing those on the hydro levers requires more work than I wanted (removing the brake lever, and things that would require bleeding the brake).

Also wound up needing to grab a longer spindle. The one I'd previously used I had used without some conical spacers on the cranks for a super narrow Q factor, but didn't want to run the same super narrow q factor on here, so needed a bit longer spindle (5.25 inch to 5.625 inches). The shorter one didn't quite protrude enough into the bosses of the cranks, so they wouldn't quite stay tight. New, longer one seems to have solved that.


Great riding bike, also my Mack high flange superlight hubs should be shipping any day now, and I'll build up my 404 tubular rims to those, and take a foray into the world of tubulars for the first time.

[MaraudingWalrus]

Have my new wheels finished up, first Tuesday I'll have ridden also. If it stops monsooning I'll ride tomorrow morning.

The tires are interesting, they're from YellowJersey. 3 for $50, and they're seemingly old style Corsas with a butyl tube. Not bad.