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Old 02-09-2017, 06:13 AM
Peter P. Peter P. is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Meriden CT
Posts: 7,243
Ah; you people are all a bunch of scaredycats!

I had a steel frame that cracked about 2/3 the way around the seat tube, above the BB. I rode it for five more days until I could get home and send it out for repairs.

The headtube on my steel road bike was cracked FOR YEARS. I watched the crack lengthen and continued to ride it with nary a worry.

I had a Bridgestone MB-3 mountain bike that developed a crack around the top tube, near the head tube. I put a hose clamp around the crack and rode it for 8 weeks while I waited for a new frame.

Worst case was my steel Salsa Ala Carte mountain bike. It was cracked at the headtube/downtube junction, at the BB/seat tube junction, and at the seat tube/seatstay junction. I rode that bike for years, including several D2R2's.

Steel won't fail catastrophically, and neither will titanium. On a bicycle, the stresses just aren't high enough. Sure; the crack will likely get longer and at some point the OP will have to stop riding it, but there's no need to buy life insurance over this.

As to how and why the frame cracked at that location: Sure; the rear suspension is quite a possibility. Also, there could have been insufficient seatpost insertion so the joint was leveraged by the weight of the rider. Lastly, it could have been torsional forces from the front of the bike causing the top tube to twist, combined with a bad weld, to cause that failure.
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