Greg Parker writes:
> One thing that has always intrigued me is that the "titanium"
> parts in the Zeus 2000 group were "titanox." Sounds like an
> alloy of stainless steel and titanium, or Ti alloyed with
> chromium, or I dunno what, but it apparently wasn't CP
> (commercially pure) titanium. Most ti bike parts &
> frames/forks were CP (at the time).
>
> Does anyone know what "titanox' was?
Just speculation, but Titanox may refer to the adding of oxygen to the Ti.
I know that commonly used grades of CP Ti are not pure, they are intentionally "alloyed" with oxygen. Oxygen is rightly considered a contaminant when using true alloys of Ti such as 6AL/4V, as it decreases ductility, makes the part brittle. But pure Ti being so weak, CP has the added oxygen to get some strength. It comes in grades 1 through 4 with increasing amounts of oxy. Grade 1 if I remember correctly is nearly pure Ti and is used mostly in medical implants - too weak for any aerospace use. Grades 2 and 3 are the ones used in bicycles. Grade 4 is getting into some decent hardness but is too brittle.
In that case Titanox would be simply CP.
Googling on Titanox got me lots of hits equating it with titanium dioxide, which is not even a metal, it is a soft white powder used as a pigment. In fact I have been told it is the most prevalent white pigment in paint, white plastics etc and is the number 1 use of titanium in the world by far.
In the 1990s toured the Teledyne Wah Chang factory, where a large percentage of the Ti metal used in the US starts life (it's the size of a small city). It was our Wah Chang tour guide who told me that about TiO2 pigment being the main use of Ti. Fun fact: they had never heard of Teledyne Linair, nor had they ever heard of a Teledyne bike frame... except one that a Wah Chang engineer made for himself, before that other Teledyne sub-company had ever made a frame! They had a picture of it in their library that they found when I asked them to try to look up Teledyne Linair. The Teledyne Wah Chang engineer's "home-built" used large diameter alloy Ti, and was probably a much better bike than the Teledyne we all know.
Mark Bulgier
Seattle WA USA