Originally Posted by
Litespud
Oh boy....
Can you give me the official beng1 verdict on carbon fiber? I see a lot of those racer types using it, and now even ordinary people (racer wannabees!) are adopting it! Damn' plastic frippery, if you ask me....
I agree carbon-fiber is "frippery". Every now and then the manufacturers of consumer goods have to have something new to market to the public so they can get them to buy everything all over again, and most of the time there was nothing wrong with the previous generation of goods, in fact many older consumer goods are much better in many ways than current items. As time goes on consumer goods are being made that do more for those who made them than for those who buy them.
A friend of mine got a second-hand carbon-fiber road frame for pocket-change because it was cracked by the bottom-bracket. I told him to JB-weld it and try and have some fun with it, but he is not that adventurous. I think the carbon-fiber bikes are throw-away items, you will not see fifty and sixty year old carbon fiber vintage road bikes in the future that can be ridden like fifty and sixty year-old steel bikes can be ridden today as the day they were made.
I believe the only perfect bicycle frame material known is steel. The rest are compromises, jewelry or marketing tools.