Cracked Fork?
 

Is my fork cracked or is that just the paint?

http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...hulo/Fork3.jpg

http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...hulo/Fork2.jpg

http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...hulo/Fork1.jpg

If you can't tell looking at in the flesh, I certainly can't from a photo.

Given the direction of the crack, try removing the wheel and gently flexing the blades apart like a wishbone, while watching the crack. Any movement, or spreading and the fork is toast.

If this were any other part of the frame, I'd probably say ride it and monitor it daily for any change. However, I'm much more conservative about forks, since there's no redundancy, and any failure will have sever consequences. For that reason, I wouldn't ride it until the maker certified that it's safe. In all likelihood they won't want to take the financial risk an injury would involve and rather than certify it safe, would replace it and get it off the road.

I vote cracked. Do what the OP suggests.

No way to tell for sure from the photos, but I can tell you that we've sent photos of pretty much identical suspicious areas on forks as that to the warranty departments of brands that we carry and in all cases we've had a replacement fork in hand in a few days, no further review needed. YMMV.

Forks are cheap, bin them and buy a new set, if for nothing else than the piece of mind. Do you really want to be descending at high speed or driving into corners if you aren't 100% sure?

I had a friend whose fork failed during a race - a week in hospital and ended his season. YMMV

Take the wheel off, then tap a coin on the suspect area and another area entirely. A disparity in the frequency/sound indicates a likely crack.

I agree that don't ride until sure it's not a crack.

in this case, I don't think the tap test will work. That crack(?) is at the fork crown so there is metal underneath and it will be hard to get a good sense of what you're hearing

I'll give the tap test a shot. It couldn't hurt.

If it's a forged alloy crown then I'd say that this is the joint between the carbon leg and the crown letting go. The flexing tests suggested by the others will likely show if the crack is able to open and close with flexing. If it does then it's certainly dead meat on a stick.

Don't ride it until you know it's safe.

X ray would be more definitive..
scanning electron microscope pictures can be internet posted too..

black stuff in pictures doesn't work well with cell phones, apparently.