I stopped using carbon bikes after my first one. I am 155lbs. and seatpost cracked lengthwise after only owning it for several months, then also cracked the second warranty replacement the same way, even when using correct torque wrench on it. I got an aluminum post for the third try.
I got nervous about my composite forks and brake adjustments. That's when I decided my next bike would be all metal. I googled "metal bikes", "aluminum bikes" and discovered Rivendell bikes with the herringbone sides on their website. Been on Rivbikes ever since and feel much better knowing I can wrench on my own bikes with a little more tolerance than carbon when I tighten something down. Scary after crashing a carbon bike, too and scratching it up, never knowing if and when the scratches might become catastrophic phailure points. I know one randonneur who replaces his carbon forks on his aluminum frame ever three years for fear of failure. I never cottoned to the "but they use it on airplanes" sales pitch for carbon. Yes, but they probably engineer it to allow for much more stress than a plane is subject to. Not so sure that kind of nice engineering goes into bikes though with all the busted carbon one can read about. Even a featherweight TdeF rider one year had his seatpost snap totally in half. All anecdotal, but it lessens my confidence in the carbon, especially when Leonard Zinn advocates replacing carbon handlebars after 3 years for fear of failure, iirc from his road bike maintenance book. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
