# are there titanium edged snowboards?



## Zee (Feb 21, 2008)

Burton Method I think... I only know this because some guy had one on the chairlift and wanted to compare his Method to my lowly SL.


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## ScBlack (Dec 9, 2008)

Bataleon Enemy


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## jegnorge (Feb 15, 2010)

so are the edges much stronger than regular boards? anyone knows?


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## Grizz (Nov 10, 2008)

Any metallurgists out there?

While strong for it's mass isn't titanium also brittle and difficult to maintain a sharp edge on? Seems like a poor choice for edge material.


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## alf (Mar 14, 2008)

Regular titanium is softer than hardened steel, so it doesn't hold an edge very well. There's something called titanium carbide which is harder, but I'm not sure what its other properties are -- wikipedia calls it a ceramic so I'm not sure if that'd be strong enough to use as an edge.

I looked up Batalean's marketing blurb and they claim the edges are made of "Titanal", which is a rather funny word. Presumably they've added something to the titanium in order to trade tensile strength for hardness. I couldn't find any info on Burton's site about their edges.

I guess I've been turning into a materials dork recently..


edit: beat'd by grizz. only one point of disagreement: if I have it right, titanium isn't brittle, it's just soft compared to hardened steels


edit 2: There are some pros for titanium as an edge material though: It won't rust and it's light.


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## Grizz (Nov 10, 2008)

alf said:


> I looked up Batalean's marketing blurb and they claim the edges are made of "Titanal", which is a rather funny word. Presumably they've added something to the titanium in order to trade tensile strength for hardness.


Seems like it would make sense doesn't it. I thought the same thing for years, come to find out there is no Titanium in "Titanal", it's just a type of aluminum.


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## J.Schaef (Sep 13, 2009)

alf said:


> Regular titanium is softer than hardened steel, so it doesn't hold an edge very well. There's something called titanium carbide which is harder, but I'm not sure what its other properties are -- wikipedia calls it a ceramic so I'm not sure if that'd be strong enough to use as an edge.
> 
> I looked up Batalean's marketing blurb and they claim the edges are made of "Titanal", which is a rather funny word. Presumably they've added something to the titanium in order to trade tensile strength for hardness. I couldn't find any info on Burton's site about their edges.
> 
> ...


Titanium isn't actually a lot lighter than most other metals. It just has a higher strength to weight ratio.

http://www.azom.com/Details.asp?ArticleID=1298

I'd say that the cons far outweigh the pros. Even if you could find some titanium alloy that would hold an edge well, the common person wouldn't want to purchase the tooling to keep that edge sharp. Any tools that are capable of cutting/shaping/sharpening Ti are very expensive. They wear out very fast as well, constantly needing replacement.


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## Tarzanman (Dec 20, 2008)

First off. There are different grades of steel with different levels of hardness.
• Titanium is not harder than steel. Titanium is about as hard as low grades of steel
• Titanium is relatively strong for its weight/density (which is why people want to make airplane parts out of it)
• Tungsten carbide and fancy steel alloys are the hardest metals in the world. 

These super-hard metals would probably make for a poor snowboard edge because they have a poor modulus of elasticity. This means that if you stress the snowboard hard enough to flex it (and the edge), then these super-hard metals would be much more prone to breaking instead of bending. This also means that instead of the edges dulling gradually, little bits might very well break off.

If you were a gazillionaire, you could probably pay someone to make a snowboard with a modular diamond or granite edge. I'm not sure how well it would work in real life... but in theory if you staggered the edge with metal and then a super-hard material, you would be able to get more flex with the more durable edge. However, i'm not sure how much an edge tool capable of sharpening diamond would cost (or how long it would take to tune the board).

MORAL OF THE STORY: Spending 20 minutes tuning your edges every couple of days out probably isn't so bad in the long run


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## Triple8Sol (Nov 24, 2008)

ScBlack said:


> Bataleon Enemy


This. Along with other tech, it's a $1200 board and one of only 2 in their lineup that I haven't owned.


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## HouseMuzik (Dec 22, 2008)

titanal is used in certain models of Head's ski line in order to give the ski some additional stiffness FWIW.. as for using it on an edge I don't know what the benefit might be.


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## Derek (Dec 30, 2008)

Theeve Titanium Truck Co. © 2010

This truck company makes all their trucks out of titanium, claiming it doesn't grind down and it's super light


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