stem failure

[753]

Anyone see Tom Bonnen holding his knee after his stem busted on stage 13 of the tdf. I believe his team uses Time carbon stems. I've become more skeptical the last couple of years of today's lightweight stems, be it alum or carbon after hearing/reading of these problems. I realize stem failure might happen even with the older heavier stems like cinelli xa, but i sure didn't worry about it then. Now i would nervous to use what the market offers. We will never know how many miles toms stem had before it failed, yet paranoia exist for me. I currently use ti stems(seven,titec) what would be a reasonable life expectancy of these? yes i realize these are light stems too. Yet i believe ti rips, alum shears, i may be wrong, so maybe this would give me a little more time to avoid catastrophe.

Nothing last forever, but saftey is a concern.

753

[gt6267a]

did the stem break while he was riding or due to an accident? i saw that on oln as well, but just remember seeing him on the ground. as ussual, i was surfing the internet at the time and not paying 100% attention, but don't remember if they established the circumstances under which the stem broke.

[Bruce H.]

was his the bike where the fork cracked?

[shinomaster]

I read that a team Domo riders frame broke on him.. MAybe the weight rule isn't such a bad thing.. I know some companies can make safe light bikes but I wonder about all of them...I worry about the Ti bolts in my solido stem.

See the cervello bike profile on www.cyclingnews.com

[Dekonick]

Light is not everything. I wont use carbon stems or bars - I do use a carbon seat post - I figure that pretty safe as its loaded vertically. Anything that has a lateral load is gonna get stressed - esp if what the jerk says is right - longer stems becoming common. Force increases dramatically as a lever gets longer...and thats exactly what a stem is - and bars too for that matter.

Seems that there have been several failures this year. Makes ya wonder. :bike:

[tom2517]

I have a friend who broke his Time carbon stem too, he has since then switched to Deda Newton stem and bar combo.

It was a while ago that I wanted carbon stem and bar for my bike too, but my LBS were against it so I didn't switch, good advice!