The detachable faceplate on my 3T Motus stem cracked. I did not tighten it unduly; it is clearly a bad design. The photographic evidence:
I came across vredstein's post about his 3T Motus cracking whilst doing a search of the forum. To wit:
Originally Posted by vredstein
I had a TTT Motus stem with a removable face plate that cracked. I replaced the plate and am currently riding it, but keeping an eye on it. I got the Motus because I like the removable face plate feature and it looks good. I see several other quill stems with the removable plate, but they look like crap. I guess I'll have to either switch to one of these and deal with a bad looking stem, or go back to to the single bolt, no face plate stems.
I received a replacement faceplate from 3T just today. I really like how the stem looks. Questions for vredstein: are you still riding yours? How's it doing?
The front insert between the faceplate and the body is a solid piece of metal, while the back insert is rubber. I wonder if I overtightened (according to 3T specs) the front bolt on the hard insert, causing it to crack, where I should have tightened the back bolt on the soft insert?
I also wonder: having received the replacement, do you think putting the rubber insert in the front and discarding the hard insert would be a good idea?