Neilg7777

Hi all me and a friend both bought New FElt road bikes last Wednesday and took them out on Friday, half way down the hill the bike went into a wobble which threw her of the bike resulting in a lot of cuts and and a lot of skin missing from her elbow and face thank god for the helmet. After inspecting the bike both forks had snapped one clean and one torn and the tyre was flat. The bike shop has agreed to give her all her money back as they say it may have been a fault with the forks. So the question is she wants to buy a road bike but with alloy forks (confidence thing) can anyone recommend a road bike all the ones I look at have carbon. I bought the Felt z95 which I thought was great and she had the F85 or is there other options
Thanks Neil

dtrain

I'd look for a steel fork over alum...but I also think that was quite a fluke and carbon is still the best bet. Understandable if she's a bit shaken about riding again. But I'm not sure the carbon fork deserves that much blame.

abstractform20

thats a stupid reason to stay away from carbon.

the bike shop probably just wanted to avoid a possible HUGE p.i.t.a.

high speed wobble(s) have a laundry list of possible causes...

did you consider that maybe the flat tire led to the wobble?

dtrain

It seems like a fairly natural human reaction to me. But I agree that it doesn't solve much (if anything). Certainly an alum fork doesn't.

Neilg7777

Yes it could have been the tyre but the guys in the shop said the forks should not have snapped like that only going on what the guys in the shop said I am no bike mechanic it may be stupid but confidence is a big thing and if different forks get her on the bike again then all good

halfspeed

Rivendell sells a steel fork for the carbonophobic: https://www.rivbike.com/product-p/carbonomas.htm. It's missing the lawyer lips, so if that still scares you, look elsewhere.

Bacciagalupe

Millions of people have used carbon fiber forks successfully for years. They're perfectly safe.

Sounds like a manufacturing flaw, which could happen just as easily for a metal fork as a steel one.

cks

See if you can find one of these:

https://www.raleighusa.com/bikes/stee...record-ace-12/

Raleigh seems to have a full line of steel bikes.

zazenzach

buy a steel bike

aluminum is quite frankly, the worst/cheapest/least durable of all the bike materials.

more importantly, aluminum forks give an extremely harsh ride

Phantoj

Aluminum forks are soft:



https://www.sheldonbrown.com/rinard/rinard_forktest.html
(SR Prism is/was aluminum)

merlinextraligh

Sounds like rider error to me.

Admittedly without seeing the forks, and having a very short description of the accident, my bet is that the OP's friend got the high speed wobs, didn't know how to deal with them, crashed, and the crash cause the fork to break.

Not the forks breaking causing the accident.

Speed wobbles can occur on a perfectly adjusted bike. It's a matter of harmonic vibration, and can be exacerbated if the rider has a death grip on the bars, and tenses up when it starts.

The odds that a brand new fork spontaneously fails are vanishingly low. The odds a new rider on a new bike feels their bike wobbling on a descent and over reacts are reasonably high.


The take away from this is, not to quit using carbon forks, but rather learn how to deal with wobbles. The best way to do that is to relax, and press a knee into the top tube.

nhluhr

Couldn't agree more - I might say though that seeking to eliminate the high speed wobble might be a reasonable course of action. Often the simple change of a wheel can fix the problem. I've had bikes that are freight-train stable up to 60mph and others that seek to wobble at 35mph.

Bacciagalupe

There's a lot of possibilities. The QR skewers could have been too loose, fork could've gotten damaged in shipping, manufacturer defect, or the rider crashed and trashed the fork.

However, the shop did check the fork, and indicated it might be a problem with the fork. I don't think any of us are in a strong position to second-guess someone who has actually inspected the bike in question.

rebel1916

What he said. In my motorcycle racing days, on fast tracks the bars/front wheel would often be oscillating like crazy. It was scary, but didn't effect anything so long as you kept accelerating and stayed off the brakes. A friend works for a railroad, and there is a speed that their trains can't operate at (might be 17 MPH) because the resonance can actually cause a derailment.

baiskeli

I had one bike that had a speed wobble at about 40 mph. The first time it happened I almost crashed from panicking. I have 2 other bikes, both of which have been up to 45 MPH+, no wobbles. It's possible they wobble at higher speeds, I've just never achieved those speeds. If it does happen, I hope the fact that I've had it happen once allows me to keep the presence of mind not to freak out and crash.

himespau 

Where you are might impact what's available and what you're recommended. Based on your spelling choices I'd guess UK/Europe or Australia, no?

merlinextraligh

I'd agree we're speculating on virtually no evidence. However, it sounds like the LBS is taking the path of making a customer happy, rather than actually opining that there was a defect.

pihb

i vote replace the bike with an identical one. she tested it, liked it. maybe it was a bunk fork, maybe not, but that is what she liked. manufacturing defects are idealistically rare.

mmmdonuts

I know, right!? Though I would describe them as plush, not soft.

I would like to know where and when the harsh alu frame beliefs were applied to forks.

Neilg7777

Thanks for your comments we went to a different bike shop and the guy there gave her the facts on carbon forks and I passed on the comments from here and said it could have been loads of things. She has carbon forks on her boardman with no problems. We walked out with her buying a specialized with carbon forks so all good just need her elbow to mend know so she can get out on it and get some confidence back. Thanks again

abstractform20

why not go back to the original shop?