On Thursday, March 13, 2003, at 09:56AM, <MSCTROSE@aol.com> wrote:
>Curt
>Please tell us the testing procedure. Inquiring minds want to know. Is
>this procedure done for >gasp< modern, off topic, factory made forks as well?
I'm not Curt but I can add a voice about testing. To answer your question, yes. I believe testing is actually much better and more accurate than it used to be because of the threat of lawsuits. I know many of the old builders used to do "real world" testing. I do think people have always cut apart and pulled apart their bikes and joints. You can test strength of your joints with something as simple as a vise and long bar. There are also modern fixtures you can mount a whole frame on and it can imitate the stresses of riding to the extreme.
When I was working for The Bikesmith before I was allowed to braze anything on a customers bike I had to braze cable stops, canti bosses, and shifter bosses onto a junk frame. Next I'd use vise-grips or some other tool to try and tear off the boss. Lastly I had to cut them apart and check for over heating and penetration. This would give you a good idea of the quality of your work. Next I did the same with replacing tubes in trashed frames and tearing them apart.
When a couple years later I started working for Bike Friday I did the same thing with my Tig welds. I also put things on the alignment table and break them to see where they would break. The idea was to see if it would break where you predicted it to break. They also had a fixture used to repeatedly stress the frame for destructive testing, but alas I never got to put one of my frames on it. Destructive testing is something I think everybody who builds frames should do. I think anybody who has an interest in bikes should also cut apart a junk frame. It's east to find a good quality broken frame for next to nothing. Folks would learn a lot about the way bikes are built and how to look at build quality by tearing apart a frame. enjoy, Brandon"monkeyman"Ives SB, CA ++++++++++++++++++++ Nobody can do everything, but if everybody did something everything would get done. --Gil Scott-Heron-- ++++++++++++++++++++