Carbon Forks, how fragile?

What you are describing there^ is what happened to the steel forks on my beater, many moons ago. Slight crash, thought they were fine (little bit of bending). Bigger crash, and both fork legs parted company with the crown.

If I bent my forks, I'd replace them, and I reckon most other people would too, or at least accept that they were damaged. Also, you state that the second crash was bigger, so you don't even know if the prior crash weakened the fork or not. And they were forks on your 'beater' - old? second hand? rusted? We're comparing to brand new, necessarily expensive carbon forks here....

If the first accident happened with a carbon fork but didn't cause visibile damage I reckon most people would carry on riding them, assuming they were fine, and it may not take a **bigger **crash to snap them - they could be significantly weakened so that a pothole or some lump in the road could snap them. It's that unpredictabilty which worries me.

The distinction is that the carbon fork wouldn't give any notice before it snaps. You had ample warning with steel and chose to ignore it.

Defo, user error on my part. Second crash was'nt that big before I lost my front wheel though.

I think I know the thing you're talking about and it absolutely was not a study. It was a lighthearted 'piece' by a GP (who should have known better). Purely anecdotal and didn't isolate variables let alone try to minimise them.

I think the problem with his study was that he did try to minimise variables, but went about it wrong. His first study should have just been bike1 vs bike2 no traffic, then he could have gone on to add traffic and see. In fact what he did was start in traffic (most significant variable) and then try to balance out the weight difference by running heavy tyres on his "light" bike (and "common knowlege" suggests that wheel weight has a bigger effect than frame weight).

Why do I ask? Well, if I ask on a race forum I'll be told to go 100% carbon, if I ask the CTC they'll tell me that anything that costs more than 50p at Aldi's is a rip-off and uinless I can weld it back together over a camp fire I should avoid. So I thought a forum used mostly bu urban commuters and utility cyclists (such as myself) would give me the best advice.

While I am well tempted by the luddite pov, I also have a logical science teacher in me who reckons that carbon forks must have a place and be worth trying, my thinking is that since they are used in audaxes and cyclocross they must be robust enough for a commute. Not sure I'll fork out for them mind ...

Yeah, I agree, but the GP should have used a heart-rate monitor to make sure he was putting in at least a similar effort across the two bikes. Traffic would be the main thing, mind.

I think you've had decent advice here, and ultimately it differs person-to-person. There's definitely a performance advantage to carbon, whether or not you consider it worthwhile for commuting is up to you.

I have carbon forks on my road bike, which I occasionally commute on, but steel on my commuter bike.

I rode the same pair of £40 carbon forks while couriering for about 3 years, and they outlasted 2 frames which both cracked. Still fine with no sign of wearing out

They're not necessarily lighter than similarly-priced aluminium forks but they were somewhat more absorbent of the road buzz than alu forks I've used

... unless you're planning on loading your bike up with front panniers and crashing it into brick walls I don't think you have anything to worry about.

Carbon is the best material for forks. Get some.

(unless your dirt jumping or something)

Carbon scythe forks are standard for BMX racing, which is a lot like dirt jumping.

... except dirt jumpers tend to go slower and jump much higher, ride somewhat less smoothly and crash more.

I've never seen a dirt jumper riding carbon forks, you'd be mad to use them for something that harsh

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDZgOvoen5E&feature=related

^even Zokes can't cope...

Srsly, I've seen some pretty tough 4130 chromoly forks bend catastrophically, but never seen a pair snap at the weld (except perhaps on an old Hoffman video back when bike parts were shit)

Why anyone would trust alu or carbon forks for DJing is beyond me, but hey it's their teeth they're risking, not mine.

Ditto..did you laugh your arse off as well?? =)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDZgOvoen5E&feature=related

^even Zokes can't cope...

i like how the guy with the full face helmet comes up to help him...

=)

I've been commuting on carbon forks for a few years and never thought to worry about it. Until now.

Seriously, I think they are easily robust enough, barring crashes which is covered above. And it's less about weight, more about comfort.

Dirt jumpers are currently experimenting with carbon rims

Friend of mine has an old school DH bike (giant) with HED deep wall carbon rims, still going strong to be fair.

Think Sam Pilgrim is rocking carbons in DJ.

Recently lost a tooth, cough.

Either way it's always down to your preference what forks to ride.
I like straight trick forks myself

Either way it's always down to your preference what forks to ride.
Really? No way dude. I totally never realised that

Forks look OK on that.

I was just adding a caption.

Chill out dude.

Its just the internetz.