Madiba

My wife's 30 year-old Specialized steel bike was on our car's rear bike rack a when we were rear-ended by another driver (DUI). We were traveling roughly 30-35 mph and the other car was traveling much faster. The Specialized bike was separated from our car and is visibly minimally damaged. Our car was substantially damaged ($7,500); the steel Yakima bike rack was substantially twisted and destroyed; and our new Cannondale bike was destroyed.


My wife is inclined to have a very capable bike mechanic inspect the Specialized bike to determine if it is OK to ride (occasionally up to 70 miles a day). I am concerned that a hairline crack may not be detected by an excellent mechanic and could result in a serious failure (axle?) some time in the future.


While I understand I am speculating I'm wondering what others think.


Thanks in advance.

Andrew R Stewart 

I would agree with having an experienced eye take a look at her bike. If the frame is not damaged and the other parts (bars, wheels, cranks) are good then by all means service the bike and ride it for many more miles. This whole frame cracking fear is more talk than reality. Frames crack more from poor manufacturing then single impacts. If there's no misalignment it means that the frame likely saw no significant forces.

But peace of mind is above all. If you are too anxious to ride with your wife if she's using that old Specialized than you need to do something to change it. Andy

Barry2 

Welcome to Bike Forums.

be sure to relate the damage to rack, car, and Cannondale to the mechanic.
It might influence the decision.

Barry

easyupbug 

Have you got a local frame builder? Our guy will give you an assessment at a reasonable price and if he does any work the frame and fork will be perfect.

Polaris OBark

Ride the bike after an inspection. Listen carefully. I had a hairline crack develop where the front derailleur braze-on was attached. I heard it before I saw it. It was a new creaking noise, and it got progressively worse. Eventually I noticed the crack. Steel frames typically don't fail instantly, unless there is some severe trauma. So if you don't see anything, don't hear anything, and the mechanic doesn't find anything, congratulations.

Our Kuat rack absorbed 3 impacts, and it is a bit mashed up now, but saved having any damage to my car. Thankfully there were no bikes in the rack when this happened. It does make me worry about driving around with bikes that add up to more than the car is worth (which is the way it should be). I miss our minivan.

ClydeClydeson

As above, if there is no visual damage to the bike, and the frame alignment is not changed (shops have a tool for this, but a good way to tell is if the bike can easily be ridden 'no hands' - a bent frame or fork will make it pull to one side and be very difficult to ride no hands) then there is likely no damage.

Koyote

Given the other damages, and the fact that the other driver was at fault, I would ask his/her insurance company for replacement value for the bike -- on the grounds that there may be unseen damage. They may give it to you, and they may not even ask you to give them the old one.

Mr. 66

I'm sorry to hear about the trouble, sounds like all people are ok, that's a good thing.

Side swipe issue are imo can be visually deceiving. We always look at a bike in sideview. It's very likely misaligned. Look the bike at different angles, front, top, rear.

Here is an old Gitane frame that I bought without looking closely at. I put some wheels on it, the rear looked good in the dropouts, the front looked ok in fork. The front looked out side to side a mm or so, not bad considering it's 50 years old. I looked at it from the top centering the toptube visually to the bottom bracket. I looked the fork closer, again strait down from the top. I should only see the top side of the rim, I see the rim on the ground also. I do a lot of work that requires exact registration and perfect square. The top tube did not look square to the bb.

I didnt bother taking a top down picture most people along with photo distortion probably would not be able to pickup the issue. I put some tape on the seattube for contrast, here is a picture of front view.

See how there is yellow at the top and it slivers down to nothing on the head tube. This is out a solid 1/8" in relation to the seattube. But what is really out of alignment?

First I measure the with a strait edge level the bottom bracket face parallel to the seatube at the base and the seatlug. That was out a couple of mm. I pivot my level to the down tube that's out a bunch as well.

Now I look at the fork closer. I put a wheel on and look dead center through the steertube and valve hole. I see the edge of the rim, fork is out of alignment. Good news though, I rolled the steertube on a flat surface it's strait, but I already know it's fine from the headset install. With my flat surface and series of squares, strait edges, and measures I saw that the offset was equal, side to side out very small. but one side is 1.5 mm longer than the other.

The green frame above was impacted on the drive side. The damage on the fork probably was poorly addressed to be in the center of the crown.

Holy crap! But ya know what? It's all addressable. I'm not a frame builder, I am a craftsman.

Mr. 66

It may be a good idea to goto eBay completed sales in the last six months to get a value of bike for reporting to the lnsurance Co.

Iride01 

I'd claim the two bikes two bikes as totaled. Let the other person or their insurance agent argue that they aren't And the bike rack too. Even visually you can't really be sure when we are talking about things that should last several lifetimes. But I would have a written assessment from a bike shop about the one that might be somewhat okay.

The liable party and their insurance company should be happy to keep you happy so you don't go to one of those high profile accident attorney's that are on TV all the time. In most states, a rear-end accident is automatically the fault of the person rear-ending you. They have to pay any damages to property or persons.

Koyote

eBay value for virtually any 30-yr old bike will be close to $0. Better to ask for replacement value for a new equivalent.

Ditto for the bike rack and the other bike.

Many years ago, the wife and I were rear-ended hard. Driver was too busy eating a cheeseburger. Aside from our totaled car (for which we got a very generous settlement), they covered everything else, no questions asked. They were just hoping we wouldn't lawyer up, I suppose.

Iride01 

Have you seen the prices ask on eBay and Craigslist for thirty year old bikes?

Though I do agree they are worth close to $0 to me also.

pdlamb

Agreed. Take the old bike (or what's left of it) to the LBS, ask them to assess it for damage, and give you a written quote for the closest replacement they have in stock. Ditto for the rack. Lay those on the desk when you go see your insurance agent and see what happens -- I suspect it'll be a nice check made out to you.

Madiba

My wife and I very much appreciated everyone's constructive comments and insights.

We will likely take the flying bike to our LBS mechanic and share its story. We will weigh he says and most likely defer to his recommendations.

To clarify, both bikes belong to my wife. The clearly totaled Cannondale has now been replaced with another new bike. The 30 year old Specialized is used around town and occasionally on long rides (when we need additional bikes).

ign1te

Just retire the frame. Why risk having a serious accident?