Fork Road

Fork Road
Is it bad to ride a road bike on very badly paved roads with a carbon fiber fork?

I live in Eugene and bought myself a road bike with a carbon fiber fork. I noticed unlike a mountain bike, the bike is much more susceptible to breakage. I had one concern dealing with my daily commute, there are no smoothly paved roads in Eugene. Flat tires will happen all the time due to the terrible condition of the bike lanes but the stress that my fork endures on the ride seems extremely crushing.
How long can the fork take it?

It is really hard to tell, but from personal experience carbon is stronger than aluminum!

Having said that, I would not take my carbon fibre bike down a set of stairs or huck it off a rock .

Just how bad is the road? You would be surprised just how much your bike can take before "giving up"... If you can barely stand the ride and feel that suspension would have been nice, I'd say get a different bike. Otherwise you may be just fine. Just to give you an idea of the strength of carbon, I ran over a sign post pipe at over 70km/hr and the bike frame was fine - rear wheel was toast but the frame was intact.

Good luck and may I suggest you talk to a local bike store expert who rides in the same area?

Cheers,
Volodya

Outlawz: Fork in The Road Video (by LAFCO/Guerilla Epic)