If you like to make swooshing jet sounds while you ride or you think it’s funny/cool to hang a “remove before flight” tag from your seatpost, Niner’s got a little treat for you.
Thanks to employee persistence, they’ve come out with a very limited edition Aircraft Gray (we like Fighter Jet Gray better) color for their Air 9 Scandium hardtail 29er frame. How limited? Let’s put it this way: If you wait until tomorrow, you’re probably out of luck. Get the deets on their Facebook page. MSRP is $709.
See Eastons technical notes on Al-Sc frame manufactering as it will answer most of your questions.
http://www.eastoncycling.com/bike/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/fab_instructions-sc.pdf
Scandium frames crack a lot? What a load of crap. I’ve been working at a shop for going on 5 years that sells Kona’s, who do a lot of scandium-framed bikes, and I haven’t seen ONE come back. We’ve had alloy/carbon Meridas and Marins come back, but no Konas. So I dont know what you’re basing your assumption from.
A “scandium” frame is still an aluminum frame. SC is just an additive to the aluminum alloy, very small, usually less than 0.5%. It improve fatigue resistance and weldability. The “scandium” frame is just a marketing trick, they could call frames “zinc” and “magnesium” as well.
Cool link here, click on SC: http://www.ptable.com/.
Nice bike frame nonetheless.
Just had a fisher aluminum frame crack. It just depends on the tubing, welding, design and use. I’m sure a poorly designed and welded scandium frame will crack but so would a poorly designed and built steel/carbon/bamboo etc frame.
Good thing fisher/trek have a good warranty policy… Good chance niner has one too.
Hey, I’m not saying every scandium frame will crack… but my college roommate experienced three Air 9 frames crack on him in a little over one year. He’s a light, technically able rider who rides carefully and is not one to throw his bikes around. I train with him almost every day and have never had any issues with my non-scandium frame. So, like I said, maybe there are some good scandium bikes, but the Air 9 is prone to frequent cracking.
Sign up to receive BikeRumor content direct to your inbox.
