Concept Bikes & Bike Innovation - for better or worse

Although when I mentioned stamped out box sections I probably should have elaborated. In my head I was thinking of fancy hydro-formed shapes with engineered flex/stiffness etc and different wall thickness at any given point. I'd assumed that's where the ductility comes into it?

Trek (I think) made a DH frame out of two halves welded together, a few years ago now. It was aluminium though.

How oversized do you want to go? you get something which has to be handled with care to avoid dents.

Well that's the beauty of greater specific strength. You can have an oversized tube with greater wall thickness for the same weight. Or the same tube geometry for less weight. Or any compromise thereof.

I'm not sure that yield strength is the limiting factor for chains... At some point, elastic extension

Uh huh, fair enough, maybe elastic deformation is a limiting factor in power transmission for sprinters, maybe yield strength and therefore weight is a limiting factor for climbers. My point was that saying 'strength is never a limiting factor' was rather glib of you, without having defined 'strength' or 'limiting factor'.

I rode one of these last season, it was great fun. Only goes downhill though.