It's amazing to me some of the advice on the care of carbon fiber parts.

Don't use any solvents...don't expose to direct sunlight (ride only at night?)...be careful not to overtighten fasteners on...don't exceed a certain weight limit...pack in cosmoline between rides...don't even look at it funny...etc...

BTW, I'm getting ready to sandblast my L'UNA frame tomorrow in preparation for a fresh camo paint job.

This is to limit warranty claims for people unaccustomed to using carbon parts.

Carbons a very good material if its used for its intent. WHenever i deal with it i always use a torque wrench though, just to be sure. It is costly though. If you get cheapo carbon stuff it wont serve you well but from a reputable company like easton or trek, it will perform well. As for exposure to sunlight, i think normal riding is fine.

You want to back this up with some empirical evidence?

There has been issues with exposure to sunlight with CF materials...but those problems were mostly with larger flat panels of CF, bicycle tubing is round thus only has a small portion of the frame is ever exposed to direct sunlight...but (another but), most (if not all) CF bicycle frame companies today either paint or use a clear coat with UV protection; so sunlight should not be any more of a problem then rust is to steel-virtually nil.

However, CF does have a problem if somebody over torques a fastner can damage the frame or handlebar the fastner was to be attached to. There are handlebar on the market made of CF that forbid the use of aerobars, there has been many cases of someone over tightening brake levers and damaging bars, there has been many instances where some one over tightened the water bottle bolts and damaged the frame. This has been and still is a real problem with CF.

Your lighter weight CF frames do have a rider weight limit of usually 165 pounds...but so do your lightest AL and steel frames!

Another problem with CF is if you (actually the bike) suck a chain between the last gear and the chainstay the chain can put a nice hole in that stay where steel and TI would just lose some paint...however ultralight AL frames have done the same thing. BUT the better companies are reinforcing that part of the stay to limit the damage.

So the two biggest problems with CF is over tightening fastners and chainsuck, with fastners use a torque wrench as PhantomCow mentioned (but you need to know the amount of torque to use), and use a Lizard Skin wrap that covers the chain stay for added protection.

Post this question over in The Aussie Thread. One of the guys had his Look frame spontaneously combust (actually, it just broke) for no apparent reason. Personally, I see no advantage to CF, as it has the shortest life of the 4 major bicycle materials.

Certainly, i ran EC70's for several months and if it was not for the bar end thing i would still hvae them. I did 2 feet drops, sometimes slightly over 3', and they still looked great. They had scratches, but nothing which penetrated past the cosmetic layer. This was made by Easton...
And i dont think Trek would sell their 7000 dollar machines made from carbon if they were that fragile

Want to back that nonsense up with some empirical evidence.

That's evidence of nothing.

So what do you consider evidence? Want me to see if the guy i sold the handlebars to will ship them to you? Im sure he wont mind if you pay shipping both ways and your urge for evidence is satisfied.

Want to not be a total jerk, just once? When subjected to repeated stress cycles that cause fatigue, which material has the shortest life span? Enlighten us, bicycle Jedi master.

On just a material by material basis: aluminum has the shortest fatigue life because it has no fatigue limit followed by steel and then by titanium. CF actually, as a general category, has the longest fatigue life.

Bento box boy! Thanks for that info. What happens when we use those materials for bikes? I know you're a fan of plastic, but help me out here. I know they can use it for F1 cars and aerospace applications, but why does it seem to be the material most likely to fail suddenly? In road bikes, no less. Surely there's a reason we don't see too much on the MTB side.

[disclosure] titanium rules!

It's a lot about quality control and care. Fatigue life is one property of materials, strength is another. In those two areas, CF excels above almost every other material used in bicycle applications. However, CF has an issue with notch-sensitivity. Additionally, it is very difficult to produce a consistantly high-quality CF structure. The labour costs can exceed those of working with other materials. Some companies cut corners and that leads to integrity problems. Early on there were issues with CF frame productions as the material was fairly new and people were still learning how to work with it... especially in the areas of bonded lugs. Early aluminum frame shad the same issues. A CF frame can be made to last as long as a frame from any other material. "It's the design, stupid!"

Another thing to keep in mind: not all CF are created equal. CF is a generic description for a vary large family of materials.

I know that the early CF frames came "Unglued". I understand that quality in manufacture has a lot to do with it as well. But I disagree with your statement that a CF frame can be made to last as long as any other material. Even as long as that environmental nightmare, titanium?

Got any imperical evidence to back that up or just blowing chunks. The engineer gave it to you straight. Leonard zinn has said a CF fork has an unlimited life unless damaged.

Cool. Just hang it in the garage forever. In the real world where bikes may get a small scratch once in a while, that's a huge issue. By the way, I think our wobbly egg friend is a pilot, if I recall, and not an engineer. Someone please tell me again why CF isn't used for MTB frames. I missed that explanation.

Trek has been using it for years.

Ok, we have one company making plastic MTBs. Would you ride one?

Yeas....You seem to be having a real issue with this,and no real knowledge base to baack it up. Think real hard about CF forks.

Nope, then again I don't like Treks to begin with

The great thing about FRP is that the material is directional.
That means you can align the fibres along the expected stresses in the frame, and use less material than would be required with a material that's equally strong in all directions, but weaker than the maximum strength of the composite material.
As long as you get it stiff enough, that is.

Aircraft have been built using composites for more than half a century (longer if you count wood), and they typically stay in the sky. Rarely does an aircraft crash due to an FRP material failure.

But I wonder if we can assume ultra-light-weight bikes to be built to have a long frame life. It would seem to me that, in the quest for ever lighter bikes, they would turn to FRP, not to match the product life of the lightest metal frames, but to be able to cut down even further on product life, while still being able to build a bike that's rideable and doesn't break right away.
People who buy CFRP bikes for many thousands of dollars probably have enough money to be expected to buy a new frame every few years, and throw away the old one. That makes sense to me, at least, since ridiculously low weight seems to be the goal for some, no matter what the cost.
But this reasoning is only regarding the really extreme bikes, not the ones "normal" people buy.

Somebody finallly spoke up, well done.
Carbon fiber is a very strong material, excellent for cycling. But like anything, it has its limitations and the strength comes from design.

There is more than one.
https://www.bcdracing.com/
Scott
cannondale and yeti have used it as a pivot.
Pace make mtb sus forks with carbon fiber lowers.
Felt have some frames with carbon fiber seat stays.

Plus all the carbon fiber mtb components.

The problem with FRPs in sunlight, is that the plastic loses a lot of its strength over 150F. For this reason load bearing FRP aircraft parts like wings are always painted white. Most FRP aircraft parts are non load bearing, like fairings.