recomissioned a crashed bike

[cirian75]

Ok, last September I crashed my Specialized Allez

hit a kerb, about 15 to 20 mph with a 100kg fat lad on board

blew out the tyre, nothing else broken I can see, and I have been apprehensive ever since as its a carbon fork and they when they fail they just fail, no warning.

So last night pulled her out of the basement, cleaned it up, fitted pedals and seat, new inner tube in the front, both tyres back to full pressure.

she looks good.

planning on 3 days of abuse aimed at seeing if the forks ok, dropping off kerbs, bumping up lower ones, heavy braking before I give it the ok safe to use.

any other advice?

[counterofbeans]

Lose some weight

[yellowjack]

Let us know how it goes!

I've got an aluminium framed Merida in the garage that I was riding when I got 'T-boned' by a van on a roundabout. That has a carbon fork too, and I've never summoned up the courage to put it back on the road. Probably never will, neither...

[cirian75]

yellowjack said:

Let us know how it goes!

I've got an aluminium framed Merida in the garage that I was riding when I got 'T-boned' by a van on a roundabout. That has a carbon fork too, and I've never summoned up the courage to put it back on the road. Probably never will, neither...

Yours sounds way way worse than mine.

[Black can man]

I'd be with YJ here, i wouldn't risk it .

I suppose the only question to ask yourself is, is it worth it .You only have one head,

Especially at the speeds you go .

Edited by Black can man on Thursday 9th June 13:15

[cirian75]

I am very apprehensive about it though, its a 2010 in good nick, but its value is around £150, its not really worth putting a new fork in it.


I could strip it down and sell all bar the fork.

[cirian75]

I could do an honest Gumtree advert

"Good condition Specialized Allez, probably needs new fork"

I'm not morally bankrupt enough to just sell it as is without testing or mentioning the fork.

[yellowjack]

cirian75 said:

Yours sounds way way worse than mine.

That's the curious thing. It doesn't look at all bad. I think it's to do with going under the vehicle that hits you as to whether a bike looks damaged or not. Mine didn't. One moment I was going forwards at 14mph, the next I was travelling at the same speed through the air at 90º to the intended direction of travel. I hit the deck closer to the van than the bike did, but it is FAR from mangled. If I was a man without morals I could probably get a few quid for the fork selling it on, and there are just a few small 'kinks' in the non-drive side seatstay to say it's had a bump at all. All the more curious when the impact was enough to break my shoulder blade and got me a visit from the nice red-suited chaps in their helicopter

[cirian75]

yellowjack said:

cirian75 said:

Yours sounds way way worse than mine.

That's the curious thing. It doesn't look at all bad. I think it's to do with going under the vehicle that hits you as to whether a bike looks damaged or not. Mine didn't. One moment I was going forwards at 14mph, the next I was travelling at the same speed through the air at 90º to the intended direction of travel. I hit the deck closer to the van than the bike did, but it is FAR from mangled. If I was a man without morals I could probably get a few quid for the fork selling it on, and there are just a few small 'kinks' in the non-drive side seatstay to say it's had a bump at all. All the more curious when the impact was enough to break my shoulder blade and got me a visit from the nice red-suited chaps in their helicopter

Aside of the tyre blow out and the cheapo plastic bottle cage that broke as it had a full 750m bottle in it, it looks 100% fine.

[cirian75]

well I road it

it was very disconcerting but it felt ok

front feels good, rear end has a creak though, once every wheel rotation, and only with ride onboard.

[Herman Toothrot]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xreZdUBqpJs

Terrible weak stuff carbon, sling it in the bin or I can cover postage you can give it to me?

[gazza285]

Hit a hole last night, racing my cyclocross bike, checked the bike over tonight and found the steerer tube had a crack in it. I crashed on the first lap, raced another forty minutes without it breaking, but it could have failed at anytime. Scary.

[j00pY]

I got rear ended by a car on my CAAD8 which is alu with carbon fork. Not too hard but it broke the rear wheel and punted it across the road.

I put it back together and checked it over carefully. I gave it to a bike shop to check over too. They would only write it off without looking at it and wanted to get me to buy a new frame from them.

I rode it carefully for a bit and then abused it for a bit but now I have full confidence in the bike.

[cirian75]

Well I've abused the fork quite a bit now, I'm starting to feel confident again in it.

still don't really like this bike, I never really did but enjoyed its speed.


figured out why though.

It has a 39/53 chainring and 11/26 cassette which explains why I had trouble climbing on it when I started and why it hurt my knees a bit.

[S10GTA]

cirian75 said:

Well I've abused the fork quite a bit now, I'm starting to feel confident again in it.

still don't really like this bike, I never really did but enjoyed its speed.


figured out why though.

It has a 39/53 chainring and 11/26 cassette which explains why I had trouble climbing on it when I started and why it hurt my knees a bit.

Nothing wrong with man gears

[cirian75]

S10GTA said:

cirian75 said:

Well I've abused the fork quite a bit now, I'm starting to feel confident again in it.

still don't really like this bike, I never really did but enjoyed its speed.


figured out why though.

It has a 39/53 chainring and 11/26 cassette which explains why I had trouble climbing on it when I started and why it hurt my knees a bit.

Nothing wrong with man gears

when you left knee was already a bit dodgy before riding this bike it is, I use mega stiff bike shoes now and this has cured the issue.

[The_Jackal]

I think this stuff about carbon just going without any warning is a bit of a fallacy.
Due to its construction it tends to crack or creak as a warning or will show some physical damage.
It is stronger than you think.
There will always be someone who has one go suddenly though, but this has happened with alloy too.
If you look at some of the machines and forces they test these forks with, I wouldn't worry.
You say only the tyre burst, so the force wasn't enough to destroy the wheel, so I'm sure the force was dissipated enough not to damage the fork.