Dropped my bike...what if it had been carbon?

[geopat]

I have a 2 year old Cannondale Caad 8 which I have grown to like after a few teething troubles. Anyway took it out the shed tonight and managed to let it fall on the clothes drier support...gutted as I'm a little anal about things looking perfect.

The top bar has a small dent around 1.5 cm in diameter. Not too bad but still annoyed. My question is what if it had been a carbon frame? Would it have cracked the frame?

Thanks

 

[screenman]

Who would know? All I can say is there are carbon bikes in my rack that have had a very hard life like Trans Wales etc. That are still looking good.

From my experience alloys/steels dent far easier than carbon. Also carbon is easy to repair compared with the other 2.

 

[ianrauk]

Carbon bikes are far more durable then you think.

 

[Kiwiavenger]

It would have turned to dust!!

 

[Cuchilo]

Or bounced .

 

[Mr Haematocrit]

My bet would be, you would not have a dent.

 

[Mr Celine]

Get an empty beer or coke can. Stand on it. Get off it, make a 1.5cm dent in it. Now try and stand on it.

 

[oldroadman]

Get an empty beer or coke can. Stand on it. Get off it, make a 1.5cm dent in it. Now try and stand on it.

Which proves the inherent strength of a tubular form. However, during my race career we only had steel or aluminium,and dented tubes were not unusual in the peloton, particularly in smaller (lower budget) teams, where suppliers were sometimes a bit slow in getting replacements after crashes. They seemed to work OK, but of course the stresses are in different directions, so the can analogy while a good one, is not really a fair comparison.
Anyway carbon seems to last well enough, but there appears to be a critical point when it seems to totally go - I've seen bikes from crashes with top and down tubes sheared, carbon shards everywhere, the whole thing held together with cables and complete unrideable wrecks.

 

[screenman]

I have seen a few frames like that, none of them carbon though.

 

[Supersuperleeds]

I have a 2 year old Cannondale Caad 8 which I have grown to like after a few teething troubles. Anyway took it out the shed tonight and managed to let it fall on the clothes drier support...gutted as I'm a little anal about things looking perfect.

The top bar has a small dent around 1.5 cm in diameter. Not too bad but still annoyed. My question is what if it had been a carbon frame? Would it have cracked the frame?

Thanks

A carbon bike would have been fine, unless it was raining at the time.

 

[Rob3rt]

In answer to the OP, probably not, maybe yes.

Get an empty beer or coke can. Stand on it. Get off it, make a 1.5cm dent in it. Now try and stand on it.

What point are you trying to make and how does it relate to the question being asked?

 

[Mr Celine]

What point are you trying to make and how does it relate to the question being asked?

The one Oldroadman and presumably everyone else got.

If you try the experiment I suggested you might learn that although aluminium tubes are very strong a small dent can cause them to fail.
The OP appears to be under the impression that a carbon frame is more likely to be damaged by being dropped than his aluminium frame is.

 

[Rob3rt]

The one Oldroadman and presumably everyone else got.

If you try the experiment I suggested you might learn that although aluminium tubes are very strong a small dent can cause them to fail.
The OP appears to be under the impression that a carbon frame is more likely to be damaged by being dropped than his aluminium frame is.

A pretty awkward way to make the point that a carbon frame is not likely (or at least any more likely) to be damaged when dropping it in the way the OP was talking about... in fact I don't really think you managed to even make that point.

Oh well.

 

[StuAff]

On the very day I collected my Viner, had it in the garden when it fell over and the top tube got slightly dented by a brick. That was five years and well over 10,000 miles ago.....