A few weeks back, during our State Bicycle Ti All-Road review, a conversation about titanium unfurled in the comments. The Radavist is uniquely positioned to have this discussion as we’ve amassed more Beautiful Bicycle galleries than anyone else on the web, and a large portion of these feature titanium frames. In the eighteen years of documenting cycling culture, we’ve also amassed a large contact list in the framebuilding world.

In an attempt to demystify the material, we reached out to No. 22 Bicycle Company for a bit of Ti Talk.

First, Thanks, Bryce, for agreeing to a bit of Ti Talk. We know you’re busy with MADE preparations, so we appreciate you taking the time! Let’s get it it. Perhaps you can give us a quick introduction to how No. 22 came about.

Up in Toronto, Canada, my partner Mike Smith and I met around 2009, when we discovered a common interest/obsession with bikes. Mike grew up primarily racing mountain bikes and working in shops; I started riding road bikes in the late ‘90s when Ti was the ultimate frame material. In 2011, I was commuting on a fixed gear to my architecture job and trashing bikes in the winter salt and slush, so I drew up a Ti bike and had it made overseas – it was a reawakening of a love for the material.

Around that time, Mike was finishing up articling at a corporate law firm and was going to cap it off with a ride from the west coast of Canada to the east coast. Titanium was the perfect material for such a ride, so we had the same factory build up his frame for that adventure. Upon his return, he declared that we had to do something with the material, and No. 22 Bicycle Company was founded in 2012.

We started with a ‘proof of concept’ run of frames from the same supplier that made our personal frames, while at the same time seeking a manufacturer stateside. We moved production over to a well-known brand in Tennessee, but when it came to pushing the product forward and innovating, it was pretty clear that wasn’t the focus of their contract building.

We had kept our ears open and caught wind that the famed Serotta company was now operating under the banner of Saratoga Frameworks under new venture capital ownership and seeking contract work. We were the first to reach out and commissioned two sample frames. We went down to Saratoga Springs, NY to see the bikes and meet the team; both exceeded our expectations and we put our money down on a production run on a Tuesday. On Thursday we got the news that the factory had been shuttered.

Given the cash we had turned over came from our personal pockets, we were crushed. Fortunately, given the payment method used, we were able to contest the charge and got most of the money back which solved half of our problem – but we still needed bikes, and a super talented and experienced team of builders needed work.

In the next few weeks, we found ourselves signing a lease for a space in an old knitting mill in Johnstown, NY, joined by three of the Saratoga crew with over fifty years of experience between them: Scott Hock as Director of Operations, Frank Cenchitz as Head Welder, and Bryar Sesselman as Machinist and Finisher. With a mix of some of the equipment from Serotta that was worth keeping and filling in the blanks for the rest, we produced our first bike out of No. 22 Frameworks Inc. that summer.

Ten years later, we’re a crew of ten with almost 2,000 bikes built.

Where do you source your tubing, and why?

We use American-made tubing for some of the smaller diameter tubes, but for larger diameters, namely down tubes, that material simply isn’t available through domestic producers. US mills tend to contract primarily to aerospace and defense companies that don’t require the large diameter, thin-walled material we need for bikes so it simply isn’t worth their time to accommodate a small, tricky production run for a boutique bike manufacturer. Our material for those purposes comes from a few choice overseas suppliers, such as a Japanese mill, who produce to independently-verified ASTM standards.

 

Explain your tubing prep work protocols. For instance, your selection and butting procedures. No. 22 uses a CNC machine to make its butted tubing, correct?

We could detail this at length here, but this video series we produced a few years back really illustrates the process, as described by the people who do the work!

Do you work with customers to “tune” their desired ride qualities?

When we’re developing a new model, that’s where the heavy lifting of tuning ride qualities usually happens. In a given model, we will have targets for ride quality such as how stiff we’d like the bike to be under power, how compliant it should be at the saddle, how rigid it should be up front in hard cornering, etc. From there, we develop a full tubing library for that model with different tube specifications for each size within a given model to make sure all sizes deliver on that model’s core mission.

When we start working with a customer on a bike with custom geometry, this up-front development work gives us a really well-refined starting point, and the custom process is largely focused on fit and geometry goals. In this process, we also have the ability to vary tubing to tune ride quality; for example, using the next size up or down of a given tube for a rider who is heavier or lighter than average, or who has stiffness targets outside of our standard range for that model.

Tuning ride qualities of course extends well outside of just the frame’s tubing and geometry. We build all of our bikes to order with a deep list of options, so we make sure that every frame and the parts hung off of it are designed for that specific rider from the outset.

What does that process look like from the customer’s perspective?

We can slice the process into the following steps.

Defining rider needs. We start with a conversation about what the rider is hoping to do with their new bike: what terrain, places, and styles of riding are intended.

Selecting a model and build. With the targeted riding defined, we help determine which No. 22 model would be the best starting point for the rider’s build, and then work through customizations and build decisions to make sure their bike is perfectly configured for them.

Determine fit and geometry. We work with each customer to prepare a draft geometry of their build based on a fresh fit, or existing fit data.

Fabrication. Our team of fabricators builds the frame in Johnstown, NY. As the bike progresses through each stage of production, the customer receives automated updates on progress, such as “your frame is currently in welding.”

Delivery. For complete builds, we fully assemble and prepare the bike to a fully ready-to-ride state, and then partially disassemble it for packing and shipping.

Roughly how many people does No22 employ?

Ten: there are currently eight people at the facility, plus Mike and I.

Out of those employees, how do the numbers break down for each of the stations? E.g. do you have designated tubing cutters/millers, preppers, welders, and finishers?

It’s probably best to introduce you to the team and describe their roles.

Scott Hock (10 years with No. 22): Our Director of Operations is primarily tasked with overall management of the production facility, collaborating with model developments, and translating customer geometries into the production documents that hit the shop floor.

Bryar Sesselman (10 years with No. 22): Handles both tube prep and pre and post welding machining, as well as some finishing. If there’s ever machining requirements that require complex, skilled hands, it’s an audible “hand it to Bryar”. He’s also a bit of a wizard with anodizing and has been passing the wand (literally) to our newer members of the finishing team.

Santiago Carral O’Gorman (3 years with No. 22): Santiago joined us three years ago and comes from an industrial design background. On the shop floor, he primarily works in machining and fabrication but is also clutch in helping digitally take our bespoke parts through final design and production drawings.

Frank Cenchitz (10 years with No. 22): Frank is our head welder handles the majority of our finish welding, as well taking on some post-welding machining and Q.C.

Sam Dries (8 years with No. 22): Sam has progressed from being an assistant welder to now handling a good share of the finishing welding himself. He’s also key in tube mitering and post-welding machining and Q.C.

Daryn Dann (3.5 years with No. 22): Daryn is adept as a mechanic and handles a good share of the bike builds, but spends most of his time in finishing and is our certified Cerakote applicator, a process that’s really helped to refine our finishes.

Michala Dann (2 years with No. 22): Michala handles a lot of the anodizing and masking in finishing and is starting to make her way into the Cerakote booth.

Brad Young (New to No.22): Brad has raced for the No. 22 Factory CX team for years. Having recently retired from his ‘day job’, he’s been an asset in complete bike assembly and QC.

Why are domestically produced (US, EU, AU) titanium bikes so expensive, and some frames overseas very affordable?

Woof, that’s a big question. I think if you start thinking of other analogous scenarios, it will start taking you down the path to the answers. Why can you get a ‘fast fashion’ repro of a $1,500 designer garment for $50? Why is a Big Mac $5, but a burger at a farm-to-table restaurant is $20? I think there are three key areas to focus on to provide a succinct answer for our purposes here:

Customization, Labor, and Material

Customization

We all learned about Ford’s Model T assembly line in school: if you build lots of pieces of the identical product, you find efficiencies in both production methods (batching, automation, etc.), and economies of scale in materials and labor costs. At No. 22, every bike we make is made to order and offers the flexibility of customizing the fit points of the geometry, features, and accessories, and a plethora of finish options.

This means we don’t benefit from the economies of, say, only passing six stock sizes of a bike model through an assembly line which would consist of six tube sets, six total head tube lengths, etc. Instead, almost every bike needs a custom drawing, each tube set needs to be uniquely cut, butted and mitered, etc., and a significant range of unique material input variables need to be available. For an example of that last factor, we stock almost twenty unique head tube lengths in both integrated and non-integrated designs for forty lengths total vs the six that would be needed for the comparative stock size scenario.

The cost associated with this customization finds its way into the price, the upside for the customer is that they are paying for a product that’s uncompromising for their specific needs.

Labor

Let’s break this down into two: labor standards and practices, and time spent per bike.

All of our bikes are fabricated in the USA, where we seek to ensure our employees are properly paid for their time with further compensation beyond base pay such as paid time off, a bike accrual program, financial support for educational endeavors, healthcare benefits, etc. We also try to foster a work environment that’s fulfilling to be at in the long run. While we can’t claim to know the intricacies of the working conditions and compensation offered at foreign manufacturer’s facilities, labor standards and compensation have historically been lesser in both quality of environment and employee compensation in the main regions that mass-produced bikes originate.

Time spent per bike: Though we’re a team of eight on the production floor, we only produce roughly 200-250 bikes per year, or roughly four a week. This means there is a substantial cost of labor per bike. This can be understood through the lack of batching efficiencies, etc. described above, but is also our own doing in two other ways.

Quality: from butting to finishing, there are a number of processes each bike goes through that a large-scale manufacturer would quickly axe as superfluous and counterproductive to their aim which comes at the detriment of the quality of the product. Paul of Slow Spin Society recently visited the facility and produced a piece on their site called Crafting Perfection: Behind No.22’s Manufacturing Magic. His observations of the welding procedure do a better job than I could to encapsulate this.

“But here is my opinion on the secret sauce of No. 22’s next-level frame building: Frank and Sam, the welders, are both exceptionally skilled at their craft. This may sound obvious, but I’d like to elaborate. Frank has been welding bikes since high school, meaning he’s been constructing frames longer than I have existed! His extensive experience sets him apart from anything I’ve encountered before. We all know that when metal tubing is heated and welded; it can warp, shrink, and deform. Consequently, bike frames typically require adjustments post-welding to ensure perfect alignment.

However, during my brief time with Frank, I observed him frequently moving back and forth between his welding jig and the alignment table. And that isn’t due to uncertainty or anything like that, but rather to fine-tune his work. Frank’s unique approach to working with titanium results in frames that require minimal to no adjustment when removed from the jig. This level of craftsmanship may seem like a minor detail, but trust me, it holds immense value.”

A mass-produced Ti bike is most often welded fully without leaving the jig. This imbues the frame with massive internal stresses and alignment issues that are ‘remedied’ by cold setting the bike into place on the alignment table. That’s usually a super long breaker bar heaving the bike into a satisfactory (to their standards) tolerance. This doesn’t remove the stress from the frame and this, and improperly executed welds, are the main factors leading to frame failure.

There are a multitude of other such examples of ‘extra mile’ steps in our process that aren’t found in a mass-produced frame. Cumulatively, they result in a far superior end product.

Death by Detail: by continually trying to hone, improve, and make No. 22’s bikes the best we can. By doing so, we’re further burdening ourselves with how much work has to go into each bike. We don’t use off-the-shelf frame components and accessories and then lean on our downtube graphic and a paint job to create an identity the way many other builders do. Rather, almost every part on a No. 22 is made by or for us which tasks us with the design, procurement or production, supply chain management, quality control, and final machining and finishing of said parts.

The result is a product that’s inherently a No. 22. For example, even our headset spacers are unique to us, whether they are the internally relieved Ti spacers found on our standard routing bikes, or the CNC’d and EDM laser cut Ti spacers found on our integrated cockpit offerings. In both cases, every single spacer requires a significant amount of individual finishing to match the bike it is being paired with; a $1,831.00 frameset simply can’t match that caliber of detail and refinement.

Material

Titanium isn’t cheap, good titanium is even more expensive. Per the material sourcing question, we don’t use the cheapest tubing on the market as a means of cutting costs, and our cost of material is constantly increasing due to inflation and geopolitical factors. On top of this, delving into the pointy edge of titanium fabrication through 3D printing titanium is not an inexpensive endeavor. From my understanding, what it costs us to print a set of dropouts in titanium is comparable to what a major carbon bike brand would pay for an entire frameset; and the dropouts are nearly the most expensive component that goes into our bikes.

I hope this offers some validation of our pricing versus the mass-market bike. We’re not running super high margins and profits, nor are we attempting to imbue an assumed sense of high quality with a high price tag the way much of the disingenuous luxury market works. We work with the best people, the best materials, and the highest standards in the industry; none of which come cheap.

Can you objectively “feel” a difference between steel and titanium?

That’s a really good question. I always want to be a bit careful not to paint the ride quality of any material with too broad of a brush. Material plays a big role, but also tubing selection, wall thickness, shaping, butting, and overall geometry can have a huge impact on the “feel” or ride quality of a bike. It’s possible to use a very large set of tubes and build a steel bike that’s as stiff or stiffer than a contemporary carbon race bike, and it’s also possible to build a skinny-tubed carbon bike that rides like a noodle. There are examples of bikes in all mainstream materials that feel wonderful, and there are, unfortunately, many examples of bikes of any material that don’t.

One of the things we like about Ti is that its light weight gives you a really broad envelope of performance within a reasonable weight. Its low weight compared to steel means that we can use larger tubes to deliver great stiffness under power and in cornering, but without a big weight penalty. Ti’s flex characteristics are legendary and still shine through to bring pretty high levels of comfort to an otherwise pretty aggressive riding frame. It would likely be possible to deliver a very similar ride out of steel, but the weight would be substantially higher.

So, in an apples-to-apples comparison, I’d say that the “feel” of steel and titanium is very similar if building two bikes identically out of each material, but the different characteristics of each material mean you’re probably going to design a Ti bike with different “feel” targets than a steel bike.

What makes No. 22’s offerings unique?

We got into some of the weeds of this with the prior questions; I’ll step back and sum it up. We believe we’re at the forefront of innovative, considered design in titanium frame fabrication. We also have one of the most skilled, experienced, and proficient teams on the planet resulting in a level of execution that is not readily equaled.

The other half of the equation is ensuring that the client’s experience matches the quality of the bike we produce from understanding the client’s needs and synthesizing this into a bike with nailed geometry and spec, delivering on time (yes, it’s possible to get a custom bike on time), and providing the highest level of post-delivery support.

What are the other titanium builders No. 22 admires?

Domestically, we’ve always been fans of Firefly, their approach of treating every bike as a wholly unique undertaking from geometry to finish is admirable. What the likes of Prova and Sturdy are doing at the pointy edge of 3D printing is also very impressive.

Finally, what are you bringing to MADE? Any surprises?

We’re bringing five bikes that range from a pretty sleek Omnium-focused track bike, to a funkier gravel bike in collaboration with Dustin Klein. Oh, and something new that we think is going to represent a pretty massive push forward in the titanium road bike space; that one is still under wraps, but we’ll share the details with you as soon as we can!

 

Thanks, team! Hopefully, this demystifies titanium a bit for our readership.