datlas 

Maybe not. But the location of the broken spokes and the damage of the fork align up perfectly, so that's my thinking. As I said, no way to prove or disprove it. My suspicion is that SOMETHING got in the spokes and broke the fork. Maybe not the reflector...but the fork AND the reflector are both made of plastic. Right??

shelbyfv

I think it's safe to say that fork didn't "fail." Something broke it.

carlos danger

yes its very obvious something got in there. since the back ends are bent inwards. thats where it happened. i'm guessing a squirrel.

PepeM

Plastic something steel something other assplosion omgz disc breaks tubeless!!!

carlos danger

but i this case we have evidence of crappyness. no denying this.

TrojanHorse

This picture of a broken aluminum fork has also convinced me to never ride an aluminum fork again. Mostly because they ride like crap but also for purposes of inflammatory rhetoric.

Oh, I forgot to add - this is a clear case of Cinzano!

jideta

Sometimes when I ride in areas with a lot of debris on the road (leaves, twigs, etc) I can hear stuff ping my spokes.
I'm guessing she ran over something that hooked inwards towards her wheel (small tree branch?) and sheared the spokes and fork.
Bad luck.

Oh and about carbon forks: I was stupid enough to get a hacksaw stuck in my front wheels while riding along. Don't ask! Broke a spoke and scared the hell out of me but only rubbed the paint on my forks. Carbon is pretty tough.

carlos danger

the good old hacksaw incident. had that happen to me to not to long ago.

Jazzguitar

Hope she’s alright! Wow, I have had that happen to me on my old Trek 5200. Well, not JRA, it took me running into the back of a truck that pulled in front of me and stopped short. A clean hit going probably 10mph, I didn’t even hit the ground but my wheel with fork fork arms still attached just dropped and I was left holding the bike. I remember being amazed as how thin those carbon forks are.

Seattle Forrest

I bought a steel fork, but there's still war in the Middle East. What an I doing wrong?

Seattle Forrest

You don't use carbon forks because somebody broke an aluminum fork on the internet?

This thread is like the tin foil hat club.

carlos danger

No. this is much much better.

Litespud

I’ve seen pics of a CF fork failing like this after a squirrel jumped into the wheel. While one might expect the spokes to cut the squirrel in two, the wiry little bastard stayed intact (but dead) and the fork gave way instead. Looks to me like something more substantial than a squirrel got into the wheel and started shearing off spokes. Every time the next spoke came up, the object was slammed into the back of the fork before the spoke failed. 6-8 broken spokes and 6-8 impacts against the fork later, it was the forks turn to fail. I would’ve said a stray tree branch, but a branch stout enough to do this damage would hardly be missed. Maybe a piece of metallic road flotsam, like a tool (wrench or screwdriver)?

noodle soup

+1

canklecat

Looks like she got spoked and it happened so fast she didn't notice or remember what happened.

Go back to the scene of the crash. You might find whatever got caught in the wheel and jammed it.

Debris is easy to overlook. As alert as I try to be, occasionally I have to take my eye off the road ahead to check approaching or overtaking cars, etc. A couple of days ago as I was rounding a turn I glanced around to check a couple of cars that appeared to be intent on blowing a 4-way stop sign intersection. I took a tighter line than I'd planned on and missed a metal wire sign stake, sans sign, by a few inches. That thing could easily have flipped into the spokes and tossed me overboard.

Very common problem around here in springtime when homeowners are running nearly continuous garage sales. Even with local ordinances for sign removal, some folks just tear off the posterboard or gatorboard signs and leave the buggered up metal wire stakes behind. They only remove the sign boards that identify the owners, but leave the other garbage behind.

Worse are the local athletic events sponsored by various charities and businesses that use the multi-use path. They'll stake signs every few yards overhanging the paved and gravel paths. And after the events they don't clean up all their mess. Often they'll just discard the metal wire stakes along the grass -- those things are about like wire coat hangers, almost invisible until you're on top of them. Pisses me off. I've snapped photos and posted to the offending event Facebook pages, but nobody ever responds. Occasionally I've stopped to move their signs farther from the path but still visible. It shouldn't be necessary.

Another reason I avoid hugging the curb or using the laughably named "bike lanes". That's where most debris ends up, including bits of wire off construction crew trucks, sign stakes, fallen branches after storms, etc. That stuff is much more dangerous than flat tires from broken glass and other debris along the road edges.

dmanthree

The only thing that's safe to say is that neither of us were there, so neither one of us can draw a definitive conclusion. There were three other riders one in front two behind. None of them was her hit anything or saw anything get jammed. So, as unlikely as it sounds, fork failure is a possibility. We'll never know for sure.

MoAlpha

Good reason to put an edge on those bladed spokes!

jon c. 

Could be a case of Lebon.

WhyFi

Come on, now. Occam's Razor the situation.

indyfabz

Meaningless. I was riding with a group of about a dozen people when my front wheel locked up and I went flying over the bars and fractured my collar bone. None of the several people behind me saw the cause until one of them picked up my bike. Someone in front of me kicked up a small stick with their rear wheel. It hit my spokes (I heard it a split second before I went down), got spun up and lodged horizontally between the right braking surface of my rim and the brake caliper, causing the front wheel to lock.

Wish I had saved the photo someone took. Quite the freakish accident. The good news was that the wheel and my crabon fork were fine. No assplosions.

indyfabz

Wut. You think a razor got caught in the spokes?

MoAlpha

He means one of them kid's scooters.

WhyFi

I'm stealing MoAlpha's idea - that'll be my ™ for sharpened, bladed spokes that will help prevent stuff like this.

eja_ bottecchia

Ah, an obscure reference to Breaking Away...I like it.

Litespud

I was mulling over this the other day - sharpen up the leading edges of the spokes. Small furry animal slice'n'dice