Carbon Care OCD?

blablablacksheep

Had a conversation with a few fellow road bikers the other day and the olde, carbon word came up.

This turned into a "how do you look after your carbon "..

I was wondering, do we spend too much time worrying about carbon now-a-days given its tried and tested material now, and also its very rebust, and a lot of myths about it are now completely false.

One item that came up.

Carbon seatposts and carbon frames must be carbon pasted to stop them ceasing up/slipping.

Personally ive never pasted mine since it never slips..but im always getting told "it going to cease if you dont paste it"......currently no ceasing just a bit grubby, but that's cos i didn't remove seatpost and clean it as much as i should of.

Whats your views on this...

VTech

We have seen carbon "stain" over time but most of ours end up broken way before the point of seizing.

desweller

People don't worry about CFRP, do they? It's very strong.

But the fancy-pants parts that people fit to their CFRP bikes tend to be a bit fragile compared to the 6-speed bombproof kit we used to use, so those bikes tend to get a lot of cleaning and wrapping up in cotton wool.

Monty Dog

If your frame has an aluminium insert for the carbon seatpost, then it is possible for it to seize due to galvanic corrosion, particularly due to water ingress - that's why paste / anti-seize is a good idea.

Bozman

I've used carbon for years and i've yet to paste or torque without an issue. I've had issues with alloy seatposts in the past but nothing with carbon seatposts, i think that youve got to be pretty ham fisted to crack a post or bar.