Originally Posted by
Blackdays
Carbon fiber has no fatigue life. If used properly, it will last forever.
Stress is very important relative to its weave. For example, a lot of carbon bikes won't take horizontal stress as well as vertical stress.
Read:
http://www.firehole.com/documents/mc...posites_WP.pdf
I remeber seeing that doc, didn't have time to read the whole thing last time I saw it and kind forgot about it... carbon is certainly a fascinating material... a lot of folks remember some of the really early carbon bikes, like the first trek Y frames... a neighbor of mine in college had one, he wrecked it on campus (center of the frame land on a brick retaining wall) and the frame shattered like a light bulb, figuratively speaking... i'm sure many heard the horror stories of early carbon... and I'm sure many have seen the busted carbon website... there is a lot of disinformation out there about carbon, for sure