Originally Posted by
3alarmer
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...all of my mechanical doings for the last five years are in a bike co-op setting, so I'm not much good for an opinion. I think you need high zoot shop mechanics, and many of them are too young now to have had any professional experience in the age of steel. I will say that, based on my real world experience, it was much more difficult to resell a donated CF bike, because there was always that underlying paranoia about how "it might be cracked somewhere, and how could you tell ?"
Yes, very good point. When buying used CF, you don't know if it may have sustained a substantial impact which left no visible marks; or, if there is cosmetic damage, is it really just cosmetic, or something deeper- or a sign that the bike sustained an impact? When I bought a used Venge, I went over it with a fine-toothed comb. I would not have bought it if I was not able to inspect it personally first- like on Ebay or something. (The Venge was fine, but I sold it after 6 months- I just prefer the road feel of real metal- and quite frankly, my AL Klein rides just as good.)
Originally Posted by
Andrew R Stewart
I just voted but as with so many polls the questions are not really descriptive enough for my nuanced views.
"As a percentage of the number of XXX bikes sold" is the added aspect I answered with in my mind. So given the number of carbon frames sold I see more broken ones then the steel frames I see as a percentage of those sold.
While I've seen far more steel frames with problems over the years (I'm going on 42 years in the industry) the number of steel frames sold FAR out weigh the number of carbon ones. Andy.
I hear what you're saying- but I'd imagine that if CF is failing at a higher rate than steel/Ti/AL, with your experience, you'd notice an increase in the number of people coming in with busted frames today vs. 40 years ago, no? (CF is ubiquitous today...but steel was ubiquitous 40 years ago).
Ironic though, I often complain (Like when Gallup calls, etc.) that poll answers aren't specific enough- "It's not just a matter of A or B, but maybe C, D, E or F, too" -and now here i am creating a poll which is too general?!
Originally Posted by
FastJake
Oh, you mean a bunch of random opinions from people that are (probably) biased one way or the other?
Or were you hoping to stumble on every bike mechanic's list of "___ carbon frames broke this year versus ___ steel/Al/Ti frames broke this year and this is how many we sold" and then hoping you'd have enough data to make a statistically sound conclusion?
Good luck.
Yes, I'm looking for real-world experience, as opposed to some hypothetical expectations put out by the bicycle industry's advertising/propaganda machine. I've encountered a mechanic who toild me that he sees broken CF frames virtually every week- and I've read of others saying the same thing, but in the case of the one I encountered, he was only in his 20's, so he has no way of knowing if what he sees is any different than what he would have seen if he had been working in a shop in say the 70's or 80's. Plus, he was just one guy.
Originally Posted by
CliffordK
It doesn't say the broken frames are actually broken CF frames.
There may well be reasons why a boom in CF would cause more aluminum failures due to increasing pressure to build with light aluminum alloys and tubing (and, of course, aging aluminum along with aging CF) as both really have boomed at about the same time.
Sorry, I don't have any personal data to share
And yours was the most helpful post thus far, Cliff!
(Sounds like something I would post!) -Hey, from reading your posts, it sounds like you've been around bikes for a while- a venerable ol....err...uh....experienced fart!
I think you'd actually have a good handle on this topic.
Originally Posted by
curbtender
You want an idea of which frames break more often, then you might want to ask in a racing forum.
Nope. I'm not just interested in ultra-light bikes which are crashed often; I'm just speaking of bikes overall- the stuff everyone rides; the regular bikes that show up in the average bike shop. Not necessarily excluding race bikes, but not interested in segregating it into such a narrow niche.