Ooops!

Well now how did you do that?

We told him to lay off the topical steroids. Obviously he didn't listen...

That headset race has seen better days as well. How did you do that?

Seriously it just happened.

I noticed on one ride, the headset came loose. So we tightened it mid-ride (stopped by a shop to borrow wrenches), and the rest of the ride went fine.

Our next ride was the Devil Mountain Double Century (206 miles with 20k feet of climbing). Around mile 55 the headset became tight on a descent and the bars became difficult to turn, the steering became heavy.

We got to the flats, and the bike became difficult to keep in a straight line.

We called SAG twice, and both times loosened the headset to see if we could complete the ride. Both times the bars became stiff after a few more miles. Eventually, we realized our ride was over since the problem was not going away, so we SAG'd it in a mile 80.

I brought it to a shop to install a new Chris King Headset. When removing the stem, the fork broke in two!

It's probably been cracked for a while.

We ended up ordering a NOS Santana 1" Chrome steel fork. I would have got a nicer fork, but we are getting a Calfee this summer, so the money is not worth spending.

However we do need our tandem up and running until then. I should have it ready by Friday. We have been invited to ride in the Devil Mountain Double Staff Ride this Saturday.

Steerer tubes seldom break.
Have broken an experimental tandem forkblade and 2 tandem frames; fortunately none resulting in a crash.
So much for the saying 'steel is real'!

you mean 'real lucky'

Wow!

That's really nice that you've been invited to do the staff ride though. DMD is on my list for next year, I've heard too many good things about how well supported that ride is. No more excuses about the long drive!

Well we went to help out at one of the rest stops, but they were actually over-staffed. So we agreed to work the Knoxville Double. That's how we got our pass into the staff ride.

It's a good ride. You should definately do it.

That is a pretty disturbing photo and has always been my single biggest fear when riding our Tandem, even more so than getting hit by a car which logically I know is certainly a bigger likelihood since some of us have been there on a single.
We also have a steel 1'' on our C'dale that we ride a lot on hilly rough roads... Since moving to the mountains years ago, I religiously pull the fork and inspect it the best that I can several times a year. I usually focus the inspection on where stress riser's might start, specifically at the end of the tooling marks on the top threads and at the 90 degree angle where the head tube meets the crown and the lower bearing race sets....to see your's fracture in mid tube is particulaly scary because that would have been the last place I would have expected a breack to occur.
Knowing how hard and fast you guys ride, I'm really glad that very bad things didn't result. Time for your Calfee for sure!

Bill J.

Look closely, the break is right above the reinforced section above the crown.

Better pics will come later.

Wow. Very scary. I'm glad you two are ok. Spooky photo, indeed.

The break did seem, as others have noted, pretty unusual until you noted the steerer was butted / reinforced. That latter makes me think 'inherent stress riser' and also makes me wonder just how hard a life your Santana may have led before you acquired it.

Of course, I'm also reminded of this posting back in December where you originally identified the fork as feeling sloppy...

So, now I'm curious. Did you ever pull the fork to inspect it or contact Santana to get the service history on that vintage fork?

That is scary! Just glad it didn't fell apart while riding it and you guys are ok.

No I didn't and I should have.

We are the 2nd owners. The first owners didn't use it all that much. But we have seriously used that bike.

We have had it just over one year, and put around 3500-3800 miles on. Probably around 350,000 to 400,000 feet of climbing, and thus descending.

I don't think 1" steer tubes are good for tough tandem riding for a long period of time. The bike will make a nice backup should our new bike need any work in the future.

Hmmmm... I'm reminded of that one-owner Dodge Charger driven only on the weekends by a little old lady.

Well, as I'm sure all of us have either posted or thought to ourselves, good that the problem was discovered in a non-dramatic / non-traumatic way.

hehe! And even if the used car salesman is telling the truth, she may have been "The Little Old Lady From Pasadena"!! (If you get that reference, you're old, too!)

In all the years I was in the bike biz, I never saw a break like that. Matter of fact, the ONLY times I've ever seen a fork give way in the middle of the steerer like that were when the quill stem binder bolt was overtightened dramatically on some of the 70s and 80s era aluminum steerers. Viscounts and Alans come to mind. But those all resulted in a vertical split first and a noticable bulging from the inside out. I can't be sure from the pic, but I don't think I see any of that here.

Absent that, my guess is this almost had to be a metallurgical flaw, and not from any abuse the little old lady put to it. I don't expect, however, that information will have ANY effect whatsoever on that sinking feeling you've had in the pit of your stomach for the last couple of days!

Glad you guys are OK.

How many of your 9 lives did you use up with this one? You two are very lucky.

Is it a quill type headset (or ahead)?

Might be an interesting study in failure analysis. I suspect it is fatigue failure. If you could examine the break under a microscope, you might see "beach marks". These would indicate where the fracture started and in what direction it progressed.

Also, it might be interesting to see if corrosion was involved in the break - either where it initiated or as it progressed. If you hang on to it and run into a metallurgist, they could likely tell you a lot about how it happened.

Hmmm. Guess he didn't say that, did he? I just assumed it was a threaded headset with a quill stem due to the combination of a 1" steerer and "borrowing some wrenches from a shop" to adjust it.

Appears threaded from a previous photo, regardless, very lucky.

PK

You know, I'm surprised the front end didn't studder and brakes didn't squeal under braking given how the head tube was failing.

Me too. Or that they didn't pull the bars, stem and top part of the steerer right out of the frame on a hard climb! He said it just broke when removing the stem!

I'd like to get some more detail on that. HOW were they removing the stem? Was the stem frozen from lack of grease and they were having to use the old, trusty vice and 2X4 method to free it up, or were they just removing it normally by hand? Might tell us to what extent the steerer was damaged before it got to the shop.

The same thing happened to me as a kid. I picked up the bike and the broken fork and wheel fell to the ground! Apparently gravity had been the only thing holding it together. There was enough contact between the broken steerer tubes for the bike to steer properly.

I have read somewhere that Santana parts don't break or wear out, due to superior design and build quality, so it must be a competitors fork.

Glad you were not hurt.

Here are more pics.

https://www.bikeforums.net/northern-california/535601-tandem-fork.html#post8812452

Please post replies in here, I don't want to clutter the norcal thread.