Will you repair this?

[DJR]

i am a few hours ahead of you guys. Does that mean I have an unfair advantage?

 

[emoji3]

A few hours ahead on a hamster wheel that goes round and round ......... yes, obviously unfair advantage   

[shaper]

At least one of the professionals have a degree in structural engineering, THAT is the definitive qualification. Perhaps you missed the post earlier? But yes, it is still based on trust at the end of the day, much like you have to trust the plumber doing a bypass op to keep you cycling.

Did not miss it.  Yes is a qualification, but there is no governing body to set code of ethics, standards of practice within the industry, continuing professional development or accountability.

 

What comes out of this for me, if a frame is that badly damaged as the OP's is and insurance want to repair it, As it seems to be a lost cause fighting it on replacing rather than repairing.  I will be fighting the insurance company on who takes responsibility for public liability for failure of the repairs in the future as at present this seem to only be based on a level of trust from one quote saying they can repair it.

[MORNE]

snip

 

...much like you have to trust the plumber doing a bypass op to keep you cycling.

nah they sell all the parts at the local hardware....some compression fittings and some pex or poly-cop...and a mirror should get you going i think. trick is to only keep the water off for as long as you can hold your breath i think.  

[BogusOne]

Am with you on this that if the insurance industry is moving to repair rather than replace, then we should all ask this question of our insurance.  It is concerning to say the least.

 

What I have tried to highlight in my comments that it seems unfair that the insurance are shifting public liability to those who are prepared to do the repairs and there is no real form of accountability with regard to regulatory bodies or liability insurance in place.  As both Bogus and Carbon Ninja have highlighted, the good ones able to carry out such repairs with the experience, ability and reputation are few and far between and there are many without such experience.

 

As for me, am with Discovery and have had 1 road bike (seat stay's break) from a crash in a race and 1 tri bike, bent hanger and cracked chain stay and both times i was paid out insurance fully to replace the frames.

To be honest and this is just what i have observed over the years is that I really dont think that it is the Insurance company that is pushing for the repairs, its the people on the ground doing the legwork(assessors if you like) that gets fed snippets of info of an industry that most of them dont know anything about. So yes i will call it what its is, everything revolves around money so whenever someone sees a gap to score a few bucks they will promote that avenue to the max.

 

Hence my statement in my previous post of many questions that can be asked... SO there i fired a shot 

And no this shot not aimed at you shaper

[shaper]

To be honest and this is just what i have observed over the years is that I really dont think that it is the Insurance company that is pushing for the repairs, its the people on the ground doing the legwork(assessors if you like) that gets fed snippets of info of an industry that most of them dont know anything about. So yes i will call it what its is, everything revolves around money so whenever someone sees a gap to score a few bucks they will promote that avenue to the max.

 

Hence my statement in my previous post of many questions that can be asked... SO there i fired a shot 

And no this shot not aimed at you shaper

Your a lousy shot   ....... none taken on my part 

 

If this is the way industry is going and for those doing such insurance repairs, public liability insurance should be considered, especially the way the world is going with ambulance chasing lawyers!!

 

As a client having such repairs done, I would be insisting on seeing such liability insurance .... if nothing else it might, there again might not give me some peace of mind when am going downhill at 70kms/hr on a repaired frame 

[Christie]

Bunch of people with no experience or qualifications armed only with opinion: “No! We know better and the professional is wrong!!!”

 

 

I am also an expert on the subject of composites and structural engeneering.

 

I do not disagree with the carbon repairers and procedures described - there are prescribed procedures for such repairs, and the participants here sound like they do quality work.

 

I disagree with the insurer that the frame will be the same after repair. In engineering terms, it will not, and no subject matter expert will state that it is equivalent before and after.

 

I would not accept more than a cosmetic repair if I had an ultra light, high end frame like a Parlee, Colnago or Pinarello.

Edited November 28, 2019 by Christie

[Captain Fastbastard Mayhem]

Sorry.

I don't do well with someone that issues self-praise and tries to act like a know-it-all

Erm... he was giving his professional opinion, experience, methodology and some useful info... as an answer to a question that a few people had. I found it informative and intereting. 

[DJR]

nah they sell all the parts at the local hardware....some compression fittings and some pex or poly-cop...and a mirror should get you going i think. trick is to only keep the water off for as long as you can hold your breath i think.  

 I know a medic who once took his own blood sample.........and fainted .........he never heard the end of that

[floatfox]

I have done a few carbon bicycle claims before, and i would not repair that. We have a few carbon repair guys in SA that do fantastic work but I think that specific area takes a lot of stress and pressure. I would only accept it if they agree to accept all medical liabilities, and I will insist that the frame must be sent back to the original manufacturer for stress testing after the repair. This must all be done at their cost.

[BogusOne]

Your a lousy shot   ....... none taken on my part 

 

If this is the way industry is going and for those doing such insurance repairs, public liability insurance should be considered, especially the way the world is going with ambulance chasing lawyers!!

 

As a client having such repairs done, I would be insisting on seeing such liability insurance .... if nothing else it might, there again might not give me some peace of mind when am going downhill at 70kms/hr on a repaired frame 

I totally agree with you specially with some of the k@k repairs i have seen over the years... 

At the end of the day I always choose my jobs when it comes to repairs and i put my clients risk factor first... If there is any possibility that a failure in the future could cause any harm to my client i will not take on the job simple as that. And a lot of clients have in the past got annoyed with me for declining repairs because a certain repair place can easily repair it and im not reffering to my colleague Carbon Ninja

 

Anyway i need to get some work done... You boys play nice now 

[Madone69]

I am also an expert on the subject of composites and structural engeneering.

 

I do not disagree with the carbon repairers and procedures described - there are prescribed procedures for such repairs, and the participants here sound like they do quality work.

 

I disagree with the insurer that the frame will be the same after repair. In engineering terms, it will not, and no subject matter expert will state that it is equivalent before and after.

 

I would not accept more than a cosmetic repair if I had an ultra light, high end frame like a Parlee, Colnago or Pinarello.

 

unfortunately they are not ultra light

[Christie]

???? you may have a point. Perhaps it should rather be "ultra expensive"

[Capricorn]

Given the posts above, i'm restating an earlier post in the hope there's a response wrt both questions from CN.

 

Carbon Ninja: you clearly are bringing deep technical savvy to this debate. but how many others are as qualified and skilled as you? have you considered advocating for standards in the industry, or even developing them as guidelines against which insurance companies and the public can measure quality of service from other carbon repair service vendors?

 

as an aside, have you ever repaired a frame, and subjected it to the same torture tests the original manufacturer subjected the frame to? It's one thing validating standalone layups vs validating a repair in final form. It would go a very long way to dispelling any concerns the public when faced with the risk of voiding a warranty with years left on the clock.

 

wrt the first question, i ask not because it's his responsibility, but because he seems to have aligned himself so closely with industry best practices, he seems the logical option to kick this kind of thing off.

[love2fly]

I can well understand how you might be incredulous, and I am glad that you acknowledge that you are a layman. This is where trust in the expertise that I have (and you don't) is required.

 

Fortunately no one forces you to ride a repaired frame, if you can't get your head around it then you must simply opt for another solution.

 

As for the science, there's plenty but I'll make an attempt to summarise :

 

CFRP or carbon fibre reinforced plastic comes essentially in two versions, thermoplastic and thermoset. Bikes are made with thermoset resin and this is imminently repairable because it is imminently bondable.

 

New frames are made in multiple pieces that are glued together, typically stays are glued via lugs to the one piece front triangle. The join is then "taped" to make it one piece. In a job like the one that is the subject of this thread, I would emulate this process by creating an internal lug that joins the two halves of the head tube together, then I would tape the two halves. (Taping is just a term for wrapping carbon fabric on a closed surface, it's not taping like sellotape)!

 

I have a big that maintains alignment and the lug that I make is largely geometrically conformal with the internal surfaces of the original head tube. In this way a repair adds only 10s of grams to the original mass, rather than hundreds.

 

Appropriatly selected reinforcing carbon fabric and epoxy matrix then merge the two halves of the head tube via an appropriate consolidation and fibre volume fraction maintaining process. I use VI mostly, sometimes vacuum bagging. You won't find insulation tape in this workshop, no "Pap en Lap" as my colleague Anton calls it!

 

My methods are all derived from repair method standard best practice from the civilian aerospace industry. These manuals are published by Boeing, Airbus and so on for technicians to make repairs to their planes which are increasingly composite intensive.

 

Oh, and lastly, I've had the quality of my laminates tested independently. I did this to ensure a low void and high fibre volume fraction laminate a was being repeatably achieved by my repair methodology.

 

Lastly, I forgot to add, the analogy with orthopedic science is not totally valid, medicine is not an exact science where composites are, pretty much. There are many variables and unknown unknowns in the world of medicine, but luckily in this arena, its far more exacting.

All well and good from a technical standpoint and lots of nice jargon. I respect that you can effectively and cosmetically match the repair and I accept that your laminates and maybe layup are acceptable but one thing you do not account for: Carbon frames are designed to be strong in one or several directions and somewhat compliant in others. To feel this ride a steel framed road bike and get onto a carbon road bike and feel how much smoother the carbon rides over the same rough tar surface.

The repaired areas in my opinion will differ with the design and manufactured frame and the repaired frame will NOT be the same as the original.

[Christie]

@ Capricorn: I can attemt an answer to the second one:

 

The test manufacturers do are not all the same - there are few standard tests. Some can be done, but others will consume frame life.

 

There cerainly are tests that can be done to inspect the repair, like flash thermography. Imo the insurance should have it done in the case of a repair.

Edited November 28, 2019 by Christie

[Christie]

To feel this ride a steel framed road bike and get onto a carbon road bike and feel how much smoother the carbon rides over the same rough tar surface.

The repaired areas in my opinion will differ with the design and manufactured frame and the repaired frame will NOT be the same as the original.

That is 100% correct. The areas will differ and the dynamic response will differ. The difference can be calculated or measured (and I shall do so if my insurer wants to a repair on one of my bikes). Whether you can feel it, is subjective. Edited November 28, 2019 by Christie