Bicycling

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Seventh

Golden Squire
892
15
Famm_sl said:
I'm sure its a better wheelset than what was stock on mine. After the third broken spoke repair I put the damn thing on ebay and upgraded. The front has been fine, but I guess the back didn't like my 185+ ass pounding it over bumps.

I've had two Pure V Races on my mountain bikes but they both had the stitching come apart eventually. They are really comfy but the older one just got too far undone, other is holding up still for now. Selle Italia saddles seem to hold up really well but I like the Prologo the best of anything I've tried for road comfort.

I hefted a $5k carbon CX bike at a mountain bike event last fall and it was drool worthy. Seriously though, who needs that shit unless you're already sponsored?
Click to expand...

My usual riding buddy has the carbon Santa Cruz Tallboy, and the thing is done to the nines - XX1 groupset, best of the best Fox forks/rear/etc, etc. It's an absolutely incredible bike, and he slaughters me in the woods with it, but unfortunately it's a fuckin' XXL so I have no idea how it rides. (He's 6'7) The thing is hilarious, the seatpost comes up almost to my shoulders.

I still crash too much to spend that much on a frameset. If I dent up my alloy Scalpel I don't really care, but if I cracked my carbon MTB I'm pretty sure I'd die a little inside.
 
Famm

Famm

Ahn'Qiraj Raider
11,041
794
Yeah, I've had enough random rocks kick up into the downtube to be wary of carbon personally. Even on trails that aren't particularly rocky. Sometimes they are fairly sizeable too.
 
S

Seventh

Golden Squire
892
15
I guess they're pretty rugged. I don't have a pic of my buddy, but I dug up one of me looking sort of like I know what I'm doing. My friend ate shit hard kicking out the back end on this jump here (hamming it up like a couple of douchebags) and he wasn't at all worried about the frame. I think he was more embarrassed that he finally wiped out in front of me after seeing me in the leaves a few dozen times.

The one thing about this pic though is that i can't unsee my terrible right ankle pedal position. (I made it a point to work on that quite a bit towards the end of the season)
 
Famm

Famm

Ahn'Qiraj Raider
11,041
794
I have no doubt that they arestrong, its a pretty heated debate I guess and people love/swear by them. I just get hung up on that freak random accident aspect. One good sharp edge of a rock striking on carbon is potentially bad news.
 
Fifey

Fifey

Trakanon Raider
2,898
962
Famm_sl said:
I have no doubt that they arestrong, its a pretty heated debate I guess and people love/swear by them. I just get hung up on that freak random accident aspect. One good sharp edge of a rock striking on carbon is potentially bad news.
Click to expand...
Yup or one crack in the carbon that you don't see and you case on something and boom goes the bicycle.

Edit:
I always think of this video when I think of CF.
 
opiate82

opiate82

Bronze Squire
3,078
5
We went over this already in this thread, but carbon is a far superior material for a mountain bike (other than the cost) and any impact that will do enough damage to a carbon frame to cause a failure is also going to cause a catastrophic failure on an aluminum frame.

If you hit a "sharp rock" hard enough to crack your carbon frame (or otherwise cause a crack via some other type of impact) that same impact will also nuke your aluminum one.
 
Famm

Famm

Ahn'Qiraj Raider
11,041
794
I guess. I mean I've had rocks kicked up by the wheel from the trail into my downtube that sounded like they would have dented it for sure, but the AL was uncompromised. Not even talking about, like, crashes, because most wrecks the frame doesn't really smash into anything. But the random rock jumping up into the frame is not uncommon for me and they are not just pebbles either. I just would wonder how carbon holds up to that. And also would make me wary of any unseen structural integrity compromises. Maybe you've had this happen to your carbon downtube, IDK.
 
Famm

Famm

Ahn'Qiraj Raider
11,041
794
After a little googling there's threads out there about it and there are manufacturers offering downtube/BB protectors designed with this very issue in mind. Also people doing their own ghetto versions with old tubes and tape and shit.

Here's a pic from someone who had it happen to them:

exqbEiq.jpg


Would this same rock have done equivalent damage to my AL FS bike's BB? Impossible to say of course, but I've had some really massive sounding strikes down there and so far so good. I'd never even consider carbon for a hardtail now that I've learned the joy of steel.
 
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Disp_sl

shitlord
1,544
1
Trek Care Plus is awesome. Got my bike new mountain bike about 3 weeks ago, and for $150 they repair or replace anything for 3 years. I ate shit hard this last weekend when my friend and I were doing some downhills and completely jacked my rear wheel. They ordered a new one and should be getting back the bike this week at no cost to me. That plus lifetime warranty on the frame really made the whole bike an awesome deal.
 
Famm

Famm

Ahn'Qiraj Raider
11,041
794
QR skewer hardware, mounting bolts for brakes, rebuild both wheels with anodized red nipples.
 
S

Seventh

Golden Squire
892
15
I thought of the skewer, but my front is a 20MM. Oddball size (thanks, RockShox) and hard to find.

Brake mounting bolts though... I hadn't thought of that! (off to Google!)
 
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