I’m pretty bummed. I’m thinking I may have to retire my racing bike soon. I ride a Klein that sustained a small dent in one of the seatstays during a wreck last year. The bike recently got a bit of a dent in the downtube (Arrggh!! The tubes are thin!) during shipment. I’ve had the damage looked at and the consensus it that these are not anything to be concerned with. But I have been racing this bike for 3 seasons now and I have to admit that the damages sit in the back of my mind. At 200 pounds I have a feeling I put quite a bit of stress on my frame and again, these AL tubes are quite thin. How often do you guys replace your “A” frames?
at 210 I buy “Steel” frames and they keep going just like the energizer bunny
I canned my only AL frame after 3 seasons
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Yeah, I have a 20 year old steel frame that I still use, but don’t ever see me owning an AL bike that I can keep for that long. I must admit though that I do like riding AL.
How odd…
I have a klein quantum II with some sizeable dents…
I spoke to a couple of people about this. What the consensus seems to be is that a dent in the top tube is the most likely to lead to catastrophic failure. (crumpling)
The biggest thing to worry about the dents is exactly this. These thin tubes do not fail by bending, they fail by crumpling.
Anyways it comes to my point… these things are not likely to fail, however if I had money I would definately get a new frame… hey the mental part of racing counts for as much as the physical
I have a mid 80’s steel frame that will probably last at least another 15 yrs. My aluminium frames won’t last anywhere near that long. BTW, steel is real, or at least it rides nicer.
Aluminum is real. It just doesn’t rhyme.
If the dents are dime-sized or larger, I would personally bail. I’m a chickenshit when it comes to equipment risk, though. I replaced the top tube on my steel bike when it got dinged. I replace the whole spoke and nipple if one gets loose. I never fix tubes. Etc.
I just get nightmares of jagged metal edges knifing into my torso as I smack into the ground. Yikes! Get me a new frame.
it doesn’t rhyme or ride very well for that matter 
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To borrow a line from Gerard, Dan, Tom et al, any frame rides as well as its design. Its just as easy to find terrible steel frames as it is aluminum or carbon ones. I think folks are just now learning how to build aluminum frames. I’ll grant you that the old Cannondales(80s/early 90s), Treks, Vitus, and others were either noodles or bricks. That’s because people tried to build them like steel frames. Have you ridden a CAAD 7, Merckx Scandium, Specialized E5, or Cervelo frame recently? These are great riding frames, as are many others I’m sure.
I have ridden some of them and I do prefer the ride of my Colnago by a long shot
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