Carbon frames on roof racks

Matthewfalle

So given the perfect example above of the bicycle that fell apart after getting wet and sitting in someone's porc (note the use of the word "porch" and not "Aleppo") you're all still happy to leave the family at home and bomb around on potential death traps?

jmccabe

That's not a good comparison; point us at the research.

apreading

Matthewfalle wrote:

So given the perfect example above of the bicycle that fell apart after getting wet and sitting in someone's porc (note the use of the word "porch" and not "Aleppo") you're all still happy to leave the family at home and bomb around on potential death traps?

I would imagine that a steel or alu bike would have corroded under the same situations too. And that isnt a useful example as we have not been told what was wrong with it - I imagine that most likely is the carbon structure retaining moisture which expanded when it froze and broke some of the fibres that way? Now this would be unlikely to happen except in specific circumstances that are far from everyday...

Matthewfalle

Yes it is. The guy had a carbon bike. It fell apart in the rain. The manufacturer acknowledged it. End of case.

It's a bit like when Radio 4 (that's the station that doesn't play music) said that that mental Turkish policeman allegedly shot the Russian ambassador. He shot him 9 times on camera. Not really alleged.

I can't lead a horse to water (well, I'm about to have lunch so haven't got time at the mo') but I'll give you a hint (bit of Christmas sleuthing if you like) - the thesii that detail the physical destabilization of the prpoperties c/f and other uni/bi/tri material compositions isn't a million miles from here. It's also on the Williams F1 website and Parlee's website. It's also in along thread about this that was on here a few months ago that took some quotes from Cyclist magazine when they interviewed dudes from Trek Giant and a couple of others (a copy of which I have in the garage so I'll dig out after).

Matthewfalle

apreading wrote:

Matthewfalle wrote:

So given the perfect example above of the bicycle that fell apart after getting wet and sitting in someone's porc (note the use of the word "porch" and not "Aleppo") you're all still happy to leave the family at home and bomb around on potential death traps?

I would imagine that a steel or alu bike would have corroded under the same situations too. And that isnt a useful example as we have not been told what was wrong with it - I imagine that most likely is the carbon structure retaining moisture which expanded when it froze and broke some of the fibres that way? Now this would be unlikely to happen except in specific circumstances that are far from everyday...

Well they were everyday. It happened in Canada, not Aleppo. Or the moon come to that. Canada. It's quite big, first world and about 5million people live.

meanredspider

Matthewfalle wrote:

So given the perfect example above of the bicycle that fell apart after getting wet and sitting in someone's porc (note the use of the word "porch" and not "Aleppo") you're all still happy to leave the family at home and bomb around on potential death traps?

Yup - if that's a perfect example, I'm totally relaxed about my kids riding carbon bikes even. It just goes to show how resilient carbon is - especially as the bike was pretty old already and is a very early example of CF used on bikes. Bowen Island is one of the dankest wettest places I know - in fact it was a constant joke with my brother about how grim dark and wet it always was. Oh, and surrounded by sea.

Alumium parts on my Kona Cinder Cone bought at or around the same time as the OCLV Trek were horribly pitted and corroded - despite being stored inside much of the time.

Matthewfalle

meanredspider wrote:

Matthewfalle wrote:

So given the perfect example above of the bicycle that fell apart after getting wet and sitting in someone's porc (note the use of the word "porch" and not "Aleppo") you're all still happy to leave the family at home and bomb around on potential death traps?

Yup - if that's a perfect example, I'm totally relaxed about my kids riding carbon bikes even. It just goes to show how resilient carbon is - especially as the bike was pretty old already and is a very early example of CF used on bikes. Bowen Island is one of the dankest wettest places I know - in fact it was a constant joke with my brother about how grim dark and wet it always was. Oh, and surrounded by sea.

Alumium parts on my Kona Cinder Cone bought at or around the same time as the OCLV Trek were horribly pitted and corroded - despite being stored inside much of the time.

One of the rankest wettest places you know? Blimey, you've never been to Alsager then. Now that's a shittthole.

apreading

Matthewfalle wrote:

apreading wrote:

Matthewfalle wrote:

So given the perfect example above of the bicycle that fell apart after getting wet and sitting in someone's porc (note the use of the word "porch" and not "Aleppo") you're all still happy to leave the family at home and bomb around on potential death traps?

I would imagine that a steel or alu bike would have corroded under the same situations too. And that isnt a useful example as we have not been told what was wrong with it - I imagine that most likely is the carbon structure retaining moisture which expanded when it froze and broke some of the fibres that way? Now this would be unlikely to happen except in specific circumstances that are far from everyday...

Well they were everyday. It happened in Canada, not Aleppo. Or the moon come to that. Canada. It's quite big, first world and about 5million people live.

No - not every day conditions for people who dont leave their bike outside through all the seasons for several years. And in Canada where the low temps are generally much lower than the UK. Short term wetness from use or transportation of the bike in temps above freezing is far more every day for most people.

Matthewfalle

Agree completely - and many a mickle makes a muckle, especially when it comes to C/f bicycle frames. A. I or issue compounded soon turns into a major issue.

If even the dudes who are making them say there is an issue them (source: cyclist magazine article interviews with the dudes who make them) then I'd take their opinion over a bunch of very fine chaos off the internet (as much as I value your opinions).

apreading

Matthewfalle wrote:

Agree completely - and many a mickle makes a muckle, especially when it comes to C/f bicycle frames. A. I or issue compounded soon turns into a major issue.

If even the dudes who are making them say there is an issue them (source: cyclist magazine article interviews with the dudes who make them) then I'd take their opinion over a bunch of very fine chaos off the internet (as much as I value your opinions).

I have done a search for cyclist magazine article and cant find one - do you have a link?

Matthewfalle

Let me just finish what I'm doing and I'll get onto it for you. Apologies for the delay.

kingstongraham

I've lost count of the number of times I've died on mine.

Matthewfalle

Many apologies for the delay - had dinner. It was very nice, washed down with a couple of cold Peronis.

Anyhow, I couldn't in my brief search find the article I was going on about but I did find the one with Dr Peter Giddings of the U.K. Composite Centre where he bemoans the weaknesses of structural carbon fibre following moisture penetration in a uni and bi lateral plane of angle (i.e. Straight lines and curves as found on a bicycle).

It's also pointed out by some bloke from Scott that although your carbon Fibre bi-cycle may be great out of the shop unless the Minimum wage man in the Far Eastern factory has perfectly coated the resins and Fibre's both inside and out of the frame that any water penetrating through either the external lacquer or internal coatings will simply soak into the fibers causing them to separate and split from any bonding agents.

So when you have that chip on your frame or its scratched then any time it gets rained on and left untried with an external source the water is causing sub-structural De-lamination. So check your frames for chips and scratches guys!

If you're progressing onto tri material complexes that that minimizes the problem (as in the Ducati frame that had Kevlar in it as well as c/f to provide structural rigidity but caused the over stiffness of the frame that Stoner et al bemoaned) but any moisture penetration into single or double stranded c/f over and above the intended modulus is going to cause you to get dead disease.

Manufacturers are prepared for this and use a logarithm to work out the variables bug they aren't denying, and indeed are verifying (as per the article I'll find later and the thesis' I've referred to both here and a pro pos unica) that yup, don't get them wet without getting the hot air gun out afterwards.

There's also Jennings (2013), Patterson et al (2015) and the most probably now outdated King 2009) to read but as King deals with structural analysis of modular behaviors it's a tricky one for you guys to get your heads around.

Hope that helps - please don't think I'm intentionally putting a dampener on your bi-cycle riding though.

meanredspider

Fortunately a colleague of mine worked at the NCC testing CF - I will be able to help you with your research - though you'll have to wait until after Xmas...

(...though the game will be over by then )

Matthewfalle

meanredspider wrote:

Fortunately a colleague of mine worked at the NCC testing CF - I will be able to help you with your research - though you'll have to wait until after Xmas...

(...though the game will be over by then )

That would be brilliant - thank you. Always eager to learn and hopefully we can help some people.

Very much appreciated.

meanredspider

Matthewfalle wrote:

meanredspider wrote:

Fortunately a colleague of mine worked at the NCC testing CF - I will be able to help you with your research - though you'll have to wait until after Xmas...

(...though the game will be over by then )

That would be brilliant - thank you. Always eager to learn and hopefully we can help some people.

Very much appreciated.

It's not going to be very exciting. With the exception of my brother's Trek (which had just gone milky) I don't know of a single water-related failure of CF in any application. My bro's bike was manufactured 17 years ago I've calculated (he bought it around the time my youngest son was born) and was 15 years old or so around the time it failed (if my memory serves). That couldn't be more dull.

darkhairedlord

Mine collects water in the chainstay. Is it now scrap? I might have to buy a steel frame instead, that's never going to be affected by a bit of water. But don't they all come with cf forks?
Back on topic. I would never clamp the down tube as it is only designed for axial loading.

Matthewfalle

darkhairedlord wrote:

Mine collects water in the chainstay. Is it now scrap? I might have to buy a steel frame instead, that's never going to be affected by a bit of water. But don't they all come with cf forks?
Back on topic. I would never clamp the down tube as it is only designed for axial loading.

Depends on whether the laminate inside is allowing moisture absorption into the straight module fibres I suppose. You'll possibly get warp or weft there.

only if you specify that on the build.

Yup - agree completely. Seat post or spare seat post only.

svetty

Hilarious thread chaps, well done

imposter2.0

Svetty wrote:

Hilarious thread chaps, well done

Yep - love how one guy manages to patronise the entire forum - and without offering a shred of anything looking like supporting evidence

meanredspider

Imposter wrote:

Svetty wrote:

Hilarious thread chaps, well done

Yep - love how one guy manages to patronise the entire forum - and without offering a shred of anything looking like supporting evidence

The irony is fabulous

cycleclinic

oh I better stop riding my carbon wheels in the wet along with my 1992 trek and my Look. Oh but they have been ridden alot in the wet and have not fallen apart.

Make believe material science is wonderful. I also have a degree in this subject and I am a scientist turned mechanic. however we are in an age where experts are ridiculed so I wont go into the science further.

Matthewfalle

Hey - I'm not the one making the theories and writing the thesis' (thesii?) - I'm just quoting the guys who job it is to do the job they do having studied for the job. It it was my job to do their job I would have studied for that job not the job tha I currently do, which I'm sure if they wanted to do they would have studied for, not their jobs they do.

As I've said previously, I'm just a simple man.

meanredspider

Matthewfalle wrote:

Hey - I'm not the one making the theories and writing the thesis' (thesii?) - I'm just quoting the guys who job it is to do the job they do having studied for the job. It it was my job to do their job I would have studied for that job not the job tha I currently do, which I'm sure if they wanted to do they would have studied for, not their jobs they do.

As I've said previously, I'm just a simple man.

The trouble is that there's some truth that CF can suffer from extreme moisture (just about every man made material does) so, rather than funny, it just looks like you don't understand what you pretend to have "read".

That's why I find some of the comments above ironic. It's the same as many of the threads in Training, Fitness and Health - loads of people discussing half truths that pretty much none of them understand (and the truth is far too complex for pretty much every single one of us).

Theses BTW

imposter2.0

edit

Matthewfalle

thecycleclinic wrote:

oh I better stop riding my carbon wheels in the wet along with my 1992 trek and my Look. Oh but they have been ridden alot in the wet and have not fallen apart.

Make believe material science is wonderful. I also have a degree in this subject and I am a scientist turned mechanic. however we are in an age where experts are ridiculed so I wont go into the science further.

Cool - someone who can explain it all to us - as I said, not being a material scientist kind of guy I got confused with the bi-laminates and CAD design of triple complex bits (I always thought that a uni-laminate structure such as T900 c/f that Trek use in the Madone was structurally more sound (when used with the appropriate laminates and bonding agents!) than the T600 that had been proven to be a brilliant transferor of moisture through its simple molecular make up - i.e. This is why Giant changed their frame make up and the cheaper Asian manufactured frames (as, hopefully - may not hopefully for I'm sure that you wouldn't - not found in your garages) suffer from the predicticable failures and occurrences of warp/weft and intangent stress. There's always an element of material symbiosis on these things.

The Look above will (hopefully - not wanting to put any doubt in your mind) be ok because, as we all know, they are hand weaved C/f strands of T400 (same stuff as they us stab proof jackets) so will be resistant (if weaved and bonded correctly as I'm sure yours is). But there is always a chance that should sub-delamination of a structural process occur that a bi-lateral issue in uni a of the stresses may occur.

Again, sorry for taking up so much thread space but I hope I'm making some sense: this isn't really my neck of the woods but I tend to read a lot of stuff while waiting for things to happen!

imposter2.0

Matthewfalle wrote:

Hey - I'm not the one making the theories and writing the thesis' (thesii?) - I'm just quoting the guys who job it is to do the job they do having studied for the job.

The thing is, nobody knows that, because you are offering no actual evidence in terms of source material. Quoting a few lines out of context from 'apparent' studies on the subject is not really valid. You were asked for the sources, but never actually came up with anything useful.

meanredspider wrote:

That's why I find some of the comments above ironic. It's the same as many of the threads in Training, Fitness and Health - loads of people discussing half truths that pretty much none of them understand (and the truth is far too complex for pretty much every single one of us).

Theses BTW

Like anything else, science is the only thing that people can fall back on - and you either choose to accept it, or you don't. Not accepting it is fine, of course, but it usually helps to come up with an alternative perspective if/when that becomes the case. Unfortunately for Matthew, he is claiming science backs up what he is saying, but without actually providing any evidence of that. He may well be right for all I know, but I hope he'll forgive me for not taking his word for it until I see the evidence.

meanredspider

Yes - of course he's provided no evidence

Matthewfalle

Well. Apart from pasting links to theses (thank you MRS for the clarification - very much appreciated: see: every day is a school day!) that I've quoted both in this thread and posts seriatim/passim, I can't transpose huge tracts of copywrited work here to and same: if anything is plagiarism and the least thing I want to is get in trouble with anyone! Woe betide that at this time of year!

Anyhow, to return précis: a lot of the factors following the post material absorption (as quoted by Jenkins 2014 when he studied molecular transfer for, amongst other things, c/f use in medical and environmental transpositional layering (but the factors affecting absorptions are simply the same) are to do with vibration.

To break it down (no pun intended), free, forced and damped vibration affects the moisture absorption within the c/f Fibre's: this is what actually causes the molecular structures of the c/f to break down: this is why you all get cracks in your paintwork and then post on here saying "is this crack going to get me dead disease?"

The paint work bonds to the c/f laminates in exactly the same way as the laminates bond to each other: with primary, secondary and tertiary layers of polymers (polyethylene oxide is one of these) but this isn't to be confused with the anticipated returns of its elastic modulus.

To cut a long story short, vibration (high, medium, low - as experienced whilst you roll along the road) will cause unsubstantiated forces to attempt to - note the use of attempt to - break down the polymer resins (source: Coulthards, 2012). Once generated should there be a countering issue (something that manufacturers like Look, Time, Colnago - before they moved to Asian production and the mass economies of production that Toray offered over BASF with silicone rich fibre production) naturally any source should of deviance will be taken out.

The flexor altra/ultra state strength is greater than that found in pure simple T300, HTS and Viscous Fibre's with sub poly-laminate bonding - i.e. Early Klein bikes and the infamous first Trek c/f frame had a 99%warranty return record.

Vibration it seems (as per Richardson and Suffolk, 2001) are major areas that affected North American (i.e. Wisconsin and the famous Big Red Barn that we all know of - see above) and why when Stork set up they decided to use highly bonded polyacrylonitrile Fibre's with a high Young's modulus. Darn Germans!

Again, many apologies if this is really long winded and, frankly, a tad dull but it's all remarkably interesting (and addictive!) once you get into it. It's all pretty darn clever if you ask me!

Matthewfalle

Imposter wrote:

Matthewfalle wrote:

Hey - I'm not the one making the theories and writing the thesis' (thesii?) - I'm just quoting the guys who job it is to do the job they do having studied for the job.

The thing is, nobody knows that, because you are offering no actual evidence in terms of source material. Quoting a few lines out of context from 'apparent' studies on the subject is not really valid. You were asked for the sources, but never actually came up with anything useful.

meanredspider wrote:

That's why I find some of the comments above ironic. It's the same as many of the threads in Training, Fitness and Health - loads of people discussing half truths that pretty much none of them understand (and the truth is far too complex for pretty much every single one of us).

Theses BTW

Like anything else, science is the only thing that people can fall back on - and you either choose to accept it, or you don't. Not accepting it is fine, of course, but it usually helps to come up with an alternative perspective if/when that becomes the case. Unfortunately for Matthew, he is claiming science backs up what he is saying, but without actually providing any evidence of that. He may well be right for all I know, but I hope he'll forgive me for not taking his word for it until I see the evidence.

Imposter: how do you know if they are, and I quote, "apparent"?

I've quoted sources, you have just shouted at me. I haven't seen any evidence from you to back up your discursive.

I think that you have none and you're just being mean.