OK, sounds good. They may fill the hole up with some more aluminum. The main point here is to be confident when riding the bike, I mean to know for sure that the hole is not a potential fracture menace. Aluminum is a ductile metal and you are lucky enough not to have that hole in a carbon frame, because aluminum is more predictable when it fails – prior to a failure it bends- . No structural damage apart from that incipient hole has appeared so far, so filling in the hole with some aluminum will probably work it out. Once the hole is filled up, apply some anti-corrosion product. Now, I´ve been searching the web to Identify which loading conditions are critical in the design of a frame to see how stressed is the stay in a bike, in terms of undesirable responses (high stresses, high deflections, etc.) or failure when Applying a variety of loading conditions to instinctively Know if there is some risk of failure even when apparently it´s not as it seems to be the case. Not bad news if you can somehow fix that hole. One simple way to present the results of one of the analysis I saw is to plot the frame geometry with the displacements highly magnified. This figure below shows several such "deformed geometry" plots for the Trek 770 frames under some of the loads mentioned earlier. Your little hole in blue, the stay in green and the most deformed areas in red. The hole and the stay are far from the most stressed areas. The next thing I wanted to check is the stress and strength criteria used to make a frame and for all possible failure modes (static failure, fatigue, etc.) at that very specific point on the stay. Even though the highest stresses when hill climbing occurs in the area in red, there is a great reduction in the blue area, just where your little hole is located. Again, the hole is located in a not so high stressed area as far as I can tell from those pictures. And then again, there are some important observations in the study I saw that let you be confident on fixing the hole up with no concern at all because the stay is not a great energy absorber area: 1 - The down tube is always the greatest energy absorber. It stores between 38% and 49% of the total. Of this, between 58% and 66% is due to torsion. The remainder is due to out-of-plane bending. In-plane bending and axial loading are insignificant. 2 - The seat tube is the second highest energy absorber. It stores between 19% and 25% percent of the total. Most of this (between 79% and 84%) is due to out-of-plane bending, while 15% to 20% is due to torsion. Again, in-plane bending and axial loading are insignificant. 3 - The top tube stores between 10% and 13% of the total energy. Between 49% and 58% of this is due to out-of-plane bending. The remainder is due to torsion. In-plane bending and axial loading are insignificant. 4 - The two CHAINSTAYS together account for 9% to 13% percent of the total energy. Out-of-plane bending accounts for 22% to 38% of this, while in-plane bending is between 12% and 21%. Note that these bending trends oppose the traditional use of elliptical chainstays with the major axis in the vertical direction. Torsion accounts for 28% to 62% of the energy storage. The apparent wide range of percentages here stems from the different loads encountered on the left and right sides. Perhaps asymmetrical chainstays should be used. Cheers!
Wow! You've really given some thought to this. Well, today I went riding in Hoyo de Manzanares and gave the bike a good thrashing, and it's still holding up! In fact, below's a pic I took of some people I went riding with. In any case, tomorrow at a minimum I'm going to call Soldadura Carmona and see what they have to say. If I can feel confident about this frame (if it can be repaired), I'll get new front forks for it and keep it for cross country riding; and continue saving up for my full suspension rocket ship Ver el archivo adjunto 2775995
Ok, keep us to date. Talking of stressed material, how does that single legged fork of the bike in green performance on such hard terrain?! irat
Actually I've yet to hear anything bad about Lefty forks (not that I've looked into them much). Apparently they're really strong: they use needle bearings instead of traditional bushings. For example, evidently just today the guy in the pic got into some situation where he was going along on just his front tire, and turning! I didn't see this, and it sounds very dangerous (he didn't crash), you shouldn't try it at home, but people were saying that the fork and tire held up fine even though they sometimes break in that situation. By the way, you can see videos of people hanging off Leftys and stuff, like the guy does at the beginning of this one. [video=youtube;_WlRqcAQr2w]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WlRqcAQr2w[/video]
You really gave a lot of good information on bike frames, Interaptor. Interesting which tubes really endure the different kinds of stress. Today I left my bike off at Soldaduras Carmona and I'll pick it up on Wednesday. Hope my problem will be solved!
Well, deep inside I guess we must look at the way those lefty forks are designed, not their fisrt sight appearance. Once in the market they are supposed to be well designed, tested, manufactured and supported by those who use or make them, so simplistic answers are simply wrong when it comes to judge them. In the market we trust… not a bad sentence for liberalism and its way of life… ;-) Did a little search and saw that Carmona has a good reputation on all kind of vehicle metal modifications, their headquarter is located in Torrejon de Ardoz, so I guess it is a piece of cake for them to get your bike as stiff as it originally was and the most important thing , get you confidence back to know there is no a weak point, no matter how hard you use it. I doesn´t seem a big deal but I hope that hole is no more something to think of when riding your bike. Keep us to date when you pick your bike up and ride it!. Cheers.
So I picked up my bike today. Doesn't look bad. The wheel has about the same clearance as before. Before Ver el archivo adjunto 2781329 After Ver el archivo adjunto 2781328
Yeah, it looks like a subtle job done to mainly get rid of any concern about a weak point in the frame. You never know what a little hole in your frame is hazardously capable of if not fixed on time. It´s a good idea to apply some anti-corrosion fluid, if you don´t have any of those, some enhancement product used to strengthen women´s nails is also ok. Now safely ride the hell out of your bike! Cheers!
Hmmm, that's a good point. Need to think about some sort of anti-corrosion fluid or paint or something. I've also been thinking about wheel clearance. Here's how things look now. Left side Derailleur side There really isn't that much clearance on either side. I could put my wheel back on my truing stand and move it a little closer to the derailleur, but if I really go through mud sometime, a lot of it could end up on the derailleur. Or is it a bit close to the left chain stay? Any ideas?
Yeah, that makes sense. A simple solution. Actually I try to stay out of the mud, but in the winter it's pretty much impossible, and I want to avoid having the same problem again, mud on tyres rubbing on stays and sandpapering a hole. Anyway, good idea. I'll look into some tyres. BTW, notice British spelling
LOL Mackem´s words always straight to the point!. Narrower rear tyre , you can keep the front one :rasta, fair wise solution to give some room there depending on the tyre. Check it out with some of them, taking also into consideration how the bike looks like and how you like it to look like. Every Mackem´s word is worth at least one pound!. His next challenge in this thread is, say, just speaking the same wisdom in spanish!. It could well be the “Let´s talk about biking in Spanish” thread!...la2
:aplauso2 :lool Not bad mate! Waiting for Chainring´s rates, I think You got around 8 out of 10. B+.You just dropped an S and changed an "o" for an "a". Anyway, consider yourself as spanish as the next guy!, Your reward: :cerveza Cheers!
Ha ha ha, you're going to get Mackem writing in Spanish on the forum. By the way, I talked to my mountain bike mates and they say a narrower tyre is not such a good idea because at times we're basically doing enduro stuff, riding over rocks and boulders ("pedrolos" in Spanish) so you need a fairly big tyre to protect the rim from damage.
In Villena, and all the zone "the tall and half Vinalopo" there are a lot of trails with a grand variety of roads. The weather is very good all year, but it isn´t the beach. For example, the last saturday it was -8 on zero... (But the last weekend I´m was in Madrid (Alcalá) and hot I don´t was...) Good, in this zone There is a lot of bicycle fans, and also of bars... To end, speaking of RADON, I think that quality/price there isn´t better brand in the market. Also that you have a lot of bikes for choose. Cheers!
It was -8 degrees in Villena!? I didn't think it got that cold there, but like you say, you're not right by the beach. I was checking out Radon bikes. When I can I'm going to get a bike like the Slide AM, or maybe even the Slide ED. They look like they're a good deal. Have you heard anything about them?
guau! They are bikes full! I in these prices I don´t look never.... jajaj But I don´t think other brand it´s best. I don´t know anything about they, but with these components I don´t think that you have any problem. And the radon frame (this is the only difference) haves look good. Good solder and strong. I participate a lot of in "CENSO RADON". I invite you visit that thread, because you find good information about this bikes. If you visit you´re welcome. Cheers!
Fair enough. I am told that over the hills towards Tolosa/Pamplona where it's always wet, the locals like to ride Orange bikes. The British design has lots and lots of clearance for mud. Californian bikes only have to allow for a bit of dust.
Yes, Jessucar… Radon is an Exotic brand to my eyes. Not bad at all. And remember… Chainring is prone to have unusual and exotic bikes!!! :corazon All in all, all is about the terrain you ride on. The most popular bikes in an area depend mainly on how they cope with its weather, terrain and word of mouth reputation. It´s funny that word “pedrolo” is certainly not a good idea for a narrower tyre. The very same bike needs to be for sure prepared to ride on that such terrain. There is always an alternative of changing tyres depending on the weather/terrain circumstances. Lol I like British humor. Kinda Jeremy Clarkson´s irony that MacKem has himself. Californian bikes just for dust! :loco
