Long Distance Competition/Ultracycling, Randonneuring and Endurance Cycling - Carbon front fork

After a scenic 50 mile ride this weekend, I was cleaning up my bike on the stand. I'd popped off the front wheel to get at the brakes when I noticed some scratches on the inside of my fork - basically the path the tire rotates along.

I have to assume over time, chunks of gravel or other debris have caught a ride up on a tire and done this. These are scratches, not gouges, or cracks. To be safe, I put on a coat of clear nail polish.

What I'm really wondering, and the reason I'm posting in this forum - is this an inevitable disadvantage of a carbon fork for LD riding? I hit a lot of country roads, and my steel frame gets dinged up on the under side of the down tube and stays. I clean it up and watch for rust, but that's not a structural risk.

If I hit a light patch of gravel wrong, could it end my fork? I'd never even considered this as a failure scenario before now.

Just curious if the veteran LD riders here have any wisdom on the matter.
Thanks.

It is going to take more than tiny scratches to affect the integrity of CF forks. Short of a dent or
bits of CF waving in the breeze, I would not be concerned. By dent I mean one a mm or more deep
and clearly through the paint or clear coat.

Check with your LBS (or maybe another subforum, e.g. Road or Bike Mechanics) about using the nail polish. I believe it should be fine, but sometimes products like that will negatively effect the carbon.

They will likely also have tips on how to properly deal with minor scratches, and how often to inspect the CF.

My front fork (CF) is all scratched up, even has a few gouges from the bus-rack hook. I keep an eye on it but don't worry about it too much, I figure I'll just replace the fork at the end of the season. If it experiences a catastrophic failure (is there any other kind of CF failure?) then I'll figure it's entirely my fault and replace the fork a bit sooner the next time. As to my teeth... :innocent:

I used to have a Specialized Allez Epic (the old one with carbon tubes and aluminum lugs) and fixed up a few scratches with clear nail polish. I don't know if that made a difference, I was just worried about the scratches exposing the CF to the elements.

Another thing I did is strips of black electrician's tape in certain areas, e.g. on the bottom of the down tube and around the chain stays. You could try something similar on the inside of the forks. Or maybe there's something similar to the "invisible bra" products for cars? (to answer my own question, http://www.empireclearshield.com/site/1325795/product/PPFbike is basically what I was thinking of)

Personally, I spent so much time worrying about scratching the frame that it kind of turned me off from the idea of CF frames. A fork can be replaced quickly & (relatively) cheaply, a frame is a different matter.