Originally Posted by 79pmooney

That is exactly why I like steel frames so much - the failure mode. The bike gave you real warning. You didn't heed it. (Yes, you looked but had you looked knowing the bike was trying to tell you something, you would have found the crack, which as others above have said, has probably been showing quite a while. Granted, we don't all check our DT undersides very often.) Then, when it did break, the rest of the frame did its best to keep the show together.

I would guess that an aluminum frame would more likely to break the top tube (or top tube/head tube weld) also and I would not expect a CF frame to remain in one piece. Ti I just don't know. I am hoping my ti bikes are so overbuilt I'll never face this.

I've fully broken steel chainstays, seat tube and a fork blade and ridden all of those home or to the race start/finish. Cracked chainstays (both) and fork blades (also both and it was scary). No crashes to date to cracked or broken steel or ti forks/frames. Had my life changed big time by an aluminum fork crown failure.

I'm getting more picky about what I will ride but I will also probably keep riding the bikes I love, maybe to failure. I will also (I hope) stick to materials that fail "nicely".

And the joke - the quick fix. Whittle a dowel to fit. Shove it in, hammer the halves together, do a sexy duct tape wrap and call it good! (Many years ago, racers drove dowels into the steerers of bikes they did not trust. There's precedent. That probably saved a few hard crashes.)

Ben