[pintense]

hi,

I'm from Portugal where there is no Titus dealer. I necer saw a Titus bike, just here or in Titus website. I have a Spider and a 2003 Tracer. My question : what the differences between switch (5 inch) and tracer? Is the Switch more sturdy? Can the switch handle drops better? And what about the frame constrution(welds, tubes,..)? Could anyone send me a photo of the Hollowbox swingarm? What the shock travel (1.5 or 2) of the 5 inch switchblade?


thanks,

paulo

 

[Titus Maximus]

hi,

I'm from Portugal where there is no Titus dealer. I necer saw a Titus bike, just here or in Titus website. I have a Spider and a 2003 Tracer. My question : what the differences between switch (5 inch) and tracer? Is the Switch more sturdy? Can the switch handle drops better? And what about the frame constrution(welds, tubes,..)? Could anyone send me a photo of the Hollowbox swingarm? What the shock travel (1.5 or 2) of the 5 inch switchblade?


thanks,

paulo

I'm not too familiar with the Intense bikes, but I can say the Switchblade is very flex-free in the rear. I would guess that it is at least as strong as the Tracer. The welds are beautiful. Titus told me the stroke for the shocks that come with the 5" travel is 2''. As for drops, that's not my thing, but I'm not sure a 6 lb. frameset like the Switchblade should be considered a serious hucking bike. Small drops should be no problem though.

 

[_-^^^-_]

Hey Paulo, I wanted to tell you about the Titus bikes before you bought the Intense, but I thought you were sure what you wanted. I think the closest dealer to you is in the UK (Titus Cycles UK-Flintstone Adventures-Micheal Woodruf) they're at www.titusti.co.uk. I'll try to load the pic of the hollowbox swingarm/mainpivot, but if it doesn't load you can see it at:http://titusti.com/switchblade.html. It's the picture on the right of this page after you scroll down a bit that's called "mainpivot". What you won't see in the photo however, is how the hollowbox swingarm yoke is made, since the yoke is hollowed out from underneath, and an aluminum plate is welded over the opening and filed smooth, leaving a virtually undetectable hollow yoke. If you are a heavier rider and/or do big drops, you should be looking at something like their Supermoto FR instead. It's priced very well, but will be 2 to 2.5 lb heavier, depending on which Switchblade you compare it to. You would also have the option of a long travel coil over and link setup, vs being limited to an air shock on the Switch. This of course would be a bit less versatile, more freeride specific bike.

 

[Homebrew]

hi,

I'm from Portugal where there is no Titus dealer. I necer saw a Titus bike, just here or in Titus website. I have a Spider and a 2003 Tracer. My question : what the differences between switch (5 inch) and tracer? Is the Switch more sturdy? Can the switch handle drops better? And what about the frame constrution(welds, tubes,..)? Could anyone send me a photo of the Hollowbox swingarm? What the shock travel (1.5 or 2) of the 5 inch switchblade?


thanks,

paulo

The Tracer is a nice bike for sure but the SB is a bit more heavy duty in design and construction. The Titus Horst link is a clevis style pivot supporting the link on both sides. Titus has a 4 bearing main piovt instead of 2. The tubing on the SB is a little more beefy too. The chainstay yoke on the SB is definitely stronger than the Tracer. I've seen both Tracers and Truths crack in this area. Titus has designed it to be very strong but still lightweight. All this adds up to a stiffer more durable frame with a slight weight penalty. The SB is about 180g heavier. There are some geometry differences as well. Most noteably the bb height on the Tracer is about a 1/2" higher on the smaller sizes in like travel/head angle settings. There are some travel differences as well. Tracer is 3" and 4" where the SB can be setup with 3.75/4.5 or 5.7 or Talas with 3 travel positions. The Tracer is definitely more adjustable in terms of head tube angle and chainstay length where as the SB is fixed. As the others said, the SB is not a freeride bike but it's definitely an aggressive XC frame. It should also be noted that Intense has discontinued the Tracer in favor of the VPP Spider and XVP frames.

 

[Titus Maximus]

The Tracer is a nice bike for sure but the SB is a bit more heavy duty in design and construction. The Titus Horst link is a clevis style pivot supporting the link on both sides. Titus has a 4 bearing main piovt instead of 2. The tubing on the SB is a little more beefy too. The chainstay yoke on the SB is definitely stronger than the Tracer. I've seen both Tracers and Truths crack in this area. Titus has designed it to be very strong but still lightweight. All this adds up to a stiffer more durable frame with a slight weight penalty. The SB is about 180g heavier. There are some geometry differences as well. Most noteably the bb height on the Tracer is about a 1/2" higher on the smaller sizes in like travel/head angle settings. There are some travel differences as well. Tracer is 3" and 4" where the SB can be setup with 3.75/4.5 or 5.7 or Talas with 3 travel positions. The Tracer is definitely more adjustable in terms of head tube angle and chainstay length where as the SB is fixed. As the others said, the SB is not a freeride bike but it's definitely an aggressive XC frame. It should also be noted that Intense has discontinued the Tracer in favor of the VPP Spider and XVP frames.

While it's true that there are no frame adjustments on the Switchblade to change the head (and seat) angles, it's not entirely true that they are "set". Changing the fork length will change the angles. (This is true of any bike, of course.) This is one of the things I like most about my TALAS forx; the ability to dial in the head angle. At full extention (about 5" or 125 mm. of travel) the bike will "push" a bit in tight turns, but crank the fork down to about 100 mm. and it carves the twisties very nicely. (This is with the 4.5 inch rear travel.) That's make sense, since the Switchblade's geometry was designed around a 100 mm. travel fork. Crank it down some more for those extended climbs. Usually I leave it in the long travel setting for the plushness and stable handling, but it nice to be able to dial it in when I am fortunate enough to ride some sinuous singletrack. Or unfortunate enough to face struggling up a long climb. Ah, but what goes up, must come down. Woohoo!