Missy Giove's QR pops open

"James Annan" <[email hidden]> wrote in message "]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Shamelessly stolen from www.bikebiz.co.uk (hope all you industry types go and join up there or
Carlton will not be pleased).

James
---------------------------------

Missy Giove's QR pops open

Pilot error? Hardly. Giove was riding a Skareb fork and XT disks in California on Wednesday. Cycle
trainer Dave Smith was with her at the time and had earlier that day read the BikeBiz.co.uk
'QR/disc-brake' story and so was clued-up to the probability it wasn't Giove's fault. In fact, her
front QR had been "really tight."

"I was riding with Missy Giove and Rick Sutton [vice president of global sales and marketing for
Trixter, see bikebiz.co.ukarticle.phpOpen ↗ ] in some big redwood forest near
San Francisco on Wednesday," Smith told BikeBiz.co.uk.

"Missy's QR popped. She had definitely tightened it before the ride as she was doing some
goofy stuff.

"The Skareb had the lawyer lips intact. [The] XT skewer [was] really tight. I'd actually mentioned
your story to Rick when we were leaving the office."

Giove is planning to publicise her QR popping experience tomorrow at the Big Bear 2003 NORBA
National Championship Series, Snow Summit Resort, California.

That's just beautiful.....I don't suppose her permanent brain damage from going OTB's one too many
times has anything to do with it!
--
Slacker

Quoted message said:

Missy Giove's QR pops open

So did the lever flip open? Or did the skewer go all the way over the lawyer lips?

Is she dead?

--
Phil, Squid-in-Training

"James Annan" <[email hidden]> wrote in message "]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Shamelessly stolen from www.bikebiz.co.uk (hope all you industry types go and join up there or
Carlton will not be pleased).

James
---------------------------------

Missy Giove's QR pops open

<<snip..>>

Quoted message said:

Ahhh..sweet vindication!! ;-) Now, let's see if they industry does anything about it.

Cheers,

Scott..

"Phil, Squid-in-Training" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Missy Giove's QR pops open

So did the lever flip open? Or did the skewer go all the way over the lawyer lips?

Is she dead?

I've updated the article. It's not a bit more subjective:

Friday 16th May 2003

Missy Giove's QR pops open

Pilot error? Maybe, maybe not. Giove was riding a Manitou Skareb fork and XT disks in California on
Wednesday. Cycle trainer Dave Smith was with her at the time and had earlier that day read the
BikeBiz.co.uk 'QR/disc-brake' story and so was clued-up to the possibility (some) QRs and disc
brakes may not mix. Missy's front QR had been "really tight." But, asks Brant Richards, would
zip-ties not be a short-term answer?

"I was riding with Missy Giove and Rick Sutton [vice president of global sales and marketing for
Trixter, see bikebiz.co.ukarticle.phpOpen ↗ ] in some big redwood forest near San
Francisco on Wednesday," Dave Smith told BikeBiz.co.uk.

"Missy's QR popped. She had definitely tightened it before the ride as she was doing some
goofy stuff.

"The Skareb had the lawyer lips intact. [The] XT skewer [was] really tight. I'd actually mentioned
your story to Rick when we were leaving the office."

On One's Brant Richards is not convinced the 'Missy incident' is the Annan theory found in
the field.

"We don't know how Missy's QR popped open. She could have caught it trailside on something. It might
well have been tight, but might not have been locked over centre.

"It could have been incorrectly installed, with the clamping surface not sitting properly in the
dropout, and have settled loose, then flopped open.

"The problem now is people are now suspecting an Annan-type QR/disc problem, not the fact that
something else - several other things - could have happened!

"We have a rear disc mount on our singlespeed jump frames, and the relationship of the disc and
dropout slot means that certain riders have noticed the wheel being moved backwards by the force of
the disc brake due to the forces involved. This is only when the wheel is clamped in place by a
chaintug - a device to stop the wheel moving forwards - which spreads the clamping force over a
large area. Use of just a good old track nut usually stops this in its tracks.

"I therefore don't discount the fact that the physics and my experience show that a wheel can be
shifted in the dropout under braking load. But I do discount that a correctly installed QR of a
correct over-centre-clamp type lock won't come undone unless it's disturbed on the trail."

And Richards has a cheap solution:

"Surely something as simple as zip tieing the QR in a closed position would stop all this. It's the
bicycle equivalent of the axle nut split pin."

In "]news:[email hidden], Carlton Reid, BikeBiz.co.uk
<[email hidden]> typed:

Quoted message said:

I've updated the article. It's not a bit more subjective:

Quick releases were "coming undone" for years before disk brakes came on the scene, leading to the
infamous "lawyers lips" on drop outs, and many users then swore they did them up tight. I'm with
Brant. There are lots of alternative ways including operator error why this might have happened but
while the investigations go on into James' theory lets not jump to the automatic conclusion that
every loose QR is a disk brake problem.

Tony

--
raven-family.comraven-family.comOpen ↗

"All truth goes through three steps: First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed.
Finally, it is accepted as self-evident." Arthur Schopenhauer

I did an endo the other day in a panic stop. The QR didn't budge. Why not?

In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Shamelessly stolen from www.bikebiz.co.uk (hope all you industry types go and join up there or
Carlton will not be pleased).

James
---------------------------------

Missy Giove's QR pops open

Pilot error? Hardly. Giove was riding a Skareb fork and XT disks in California on Wednesday. Cycle
trainer Dave Smith was with her at the time and had earlier that day read the BikeBiz.co.uk
'QR/disc-brake' story and so was clued-up to the probability it wasn't Giove's fault. In fact, her
front QR had been "really tight."

"I was riding with Missy Giove and Rick Sutton [vice president of global sales and marketing for
Trixter, see bikebiz.co.ukarticle.phpOpen ↗ ] in some big redwood forest near
San Francisco on Wednesday," Smith told BikeBiz.co.uk.

"Missy's QR popped. She had definitely tightened it before the ride as she was doing some
goofy stuff.

"The Skareb had the lawyer lips intact. [The] XT skewer [was] really tight. I'd actually mentioned
your story to Rick when we were leaving the office."

Giove is planning to publicise her QR popping experience tomorrow at the Big Bear 2003 NORBA
National Championship Series, Snow Summit Resort, California.

There is such a thing as too tight. I hope someone realizes this sooner or later. I know a guy that
always used the closed end of a box end wrench to close his, he needed a pry bar to open them again
and he though he was doing the safe thing, until the drop outs on his frame spilt.
--
_________________________
Chris Phillipo - Cape Breton, Nova Scotia ramsays-online.comramsays-online.comOpen ↗

"Tony Raven" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Quick releases were "coming undone" for years before disk brakes came on the scene, leading to the
infamous "lawyers lips" on drop outs, and many users then swore they did them up tight. I'm with
Brant. There are lots of alternative ways including operator error why this might have happened
but while the investigations go on into James' theory lets not jump to the automatic conclusion
that every loose QR is a disk brake problem.

Here we have a case of a highly experienced and competent rider taking particular care to make sure
everything was tightly done up and it still came undone. It might have been the effect James
described, it might have been operator error, or it might have been an incident on the trail.
Whatever the reason it illustrates that they can come undone when used in this way. It's clearly not
a safe configuration.

The zip tie looks like it might work as a fix, but then of course it's hardly a QR any more. So why
bother with one at all?

--
Dave...

Quoted message said:

There is such a thing as too tight. I hope someone realizes this sooner or later. I know a guy
that always used the closed end of a box end wrench to close his, he needed a pry bar to open them
again and he though he was doing the safe thing, until the drop outs on his frame spilt.

spilt... their visceral contents a la Hannibal?

--
Phil, Squid-in-Training

(Dave Kahn) said:

Here we have a case of a highly experienced and competent rider taking particular care to make sure
everything was tightly done up and it still came undone. It might have been the effect James
described, it might have been operator error, or it might have been an incident on the trail.
Whatever the reason it illustrates that they can come undone when used in this way. It's clearly
not a safe configuration.

The problem with something like this is that people tend to blame any possibility OTHER than their
own screw-up when something goes wrong.

Remember the infamous Audi unintended acceleration syndrome? 60 minutes (or was it 20/20?) ran a
lengthy "expose'" which supressed clear evidence the car wasn't at fault. They even had an "expert"
mock up a scenario in which the car would accelerate itself (though the failures required to make it
happen were something that had never happened in the real world). They ignored the "detail" that the
woman who was featured in the piece admits her foot slipped off the brake onto the gas. Don't let
the facts stand in the way of a sensational story!

Suddenly, dozens of people who hit things with an Audi claimed the car simply surged out of control
despite their valiant efforts to stop it.

However, not once did the accident scene show ANY signs of braking, nor has anyone ever seen an Audi
that the brakes won't outvote the motor even if it WAS to go ballistic.

I'm afraid we're in for the same phenomenon here. Mistakes clamping down QR levers are not that
uncommon, and there's no reason to believe that those who ride disc brakes are any less likely to
screw up than others. The real problem is going to be in separating those failures from any bona
fide equipment problems.

Mark Hickey Habanero Cycles habcycles.comhabcycles.comOpen ↗ Home of the $695 ti frame

Mark Hickey said:

The problem with something like this is that people tend to blame any possibility OTHER than their
own screw-up when something goes wrong.

Well, QRs have been known to come undone. AIUI James' hypothesis is more that the braking force can
cause the wheel to leave the dropouts, which according to the mechanics of it could easily happen on
a technical downhill ride.

Guy
===
** WARNING ** This posting may contain traces of irony. chapmancentral.comchapmancentral.comOpen ↗ (BT ADSL and
dynamic DNS permitting)
NOTE: BT Openworld have now blocked port 25 (without notice), so old mail addresses may no longer
work. Apologies.

Carlton Reid said:

I've updated the article. It's not a bit more subjective:

You should have trusted your first instincts. But looking on the bright side, this does give Brant's
nonsense a public viewing rather than clogging up my mailbox.

Quoted message said:

"We have a rear disc mount on our singlespeed jump frames, and the relationship of the disc and
dropout slot means that certain riders have noticed the wheel being moved backwards by the force
of the disc brake due to the forces involved. This is only when the wheel is clamped in place by a
chaintug - a device to stop the wheel moving forwards - which spreads the clamping force over a
large area. Use of just a good old track nut usually stops this in its tracks.

"I therefore don't discount the fact that the physics and my experience show that a wheel can be
shifted in the dropout under braking load.

Well, he's half-way there, so I've not completely given up on him. As I have said before, a bit of
reasonable scepticism is a good thing.

Quoted message said:

But I do discount that a correctly installed QR of a correct over-centre-clamp type lock won't
come undone unless it's disturbed on the trail."

However, there is no explanation given for the magic fairy dust which prevents this natural and
straightforward failure. At this point a bit of honest scepticism turns into obstinacy. Why does
Brant believe that it can't fail in this way, given that it is the natural tendency of a slipping
bolt to unscrew and it has also been repeatedly observed?

Elsewhere said:

I haven't seen any evidence of vibration-related-unscrewing of the "nut" on the QR lever.

from which I can only assume he hasn't actually bothered to read my web-page yet:

ne.jpindex.htmlOpen ↗

I only put a handful of stories up there (the first and third specifically mention the unscrewing),
but there are many more consistent tales on the web and in my mailbox. Remember it has only been in
the last few weeks that people have actually known what to look for in detail. With the common
arrangement of the lever on the RHS, the most the rider will be aware of is an unexplained
loosening.

Brant (and several of the other hardened sceptics) seem to be labouring under a serious
misapprehension about this description of the failure mode. They label it a mere 'theory', spitting
this out like it is some dirty word that requires a mouthwash after uttering. Presumably they
believe I was sitting at my desk, fiddling around with equations in some hypothetical mathemacial
exercise until an answer popped out. Whereas they are out there in the real world, doing a real
man's work, not worrying their heads about this complicated stuff which scares them. In fact, it was
through looking at the large number of similar stories, picking out the salient and consistent
aspects of the failures, that the result was generated. I don't have sufficient mechanical
engineering expertise to simply look at the system and work out with any confidence what will happen
from first principles, even though it is quite straightforward to understand in hindsight.

James

"James Annan" <[email hidden]> wrote in message "]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Shamelessly stolen from www.bikebiz.co.uk (hope all you industry types go and join up there or
Carlton will not be pleased).

James
---------------------------------

Missy Giove's QR pops open

Pilot error? Hardly. Giove was riding a Skareb fork and XT disks in California on Wednesday. Cycle
trainer Dave Smith was with her at the time and had earlier that day read the BikeBiz.co.uk
'QR/disc-brake' story and so was clued-up to the probability it wasn't Giove's fault. In fact, her
front QR had been "really tight."

"I was riding with Missy Giove and Rick Sutton [vice president of global sales and marketing for
Trixter, see bikebiz.co.ukarticle.phpOpen ↗ ] in some big redwood forest near
San Francisco on Wednesday," Smith told BikeBiz.co.uk.

"Missy's QR popped. She had definitely tightened it before the ride as she was doing some
goofy stuff.

"The Skareb had the lawyer lips intact. [The] XT skewer [was] really tight. I'd actually mentioned
your story to Rick when we were leaving the office."

Giove is planning to publicise her QR popping experience tomorrow at the Big Bear 2003 NORBA
National Championship Series, Snow Summit Resort, California.

A friend of mine was training at the track a while back. He brought the bike down to the velodrome
in the back of the minivan, started unpacking, etc. Another mutual friend set up his bike for him.
Friend A feels something funny with the front end of his bike so he lifts the front wheel a little
to see what's going on. Wham! Wheel comes out of the dropouts and he goes down in a heap.

Seems friend B forgot to tell Friend A that he didn't tighten the axle nuts holding the wheel on.

So what do we have here? Should I write a paper blaming loose axle nuts and a lack of "lawyer
lips" for the accident? Maybe I can find a more famous cyclist to claim that the same thing
happened to them?

Maybe there's an idiot loose behind the wrench/QR? Maybe we have a case of "I had a McD's milkshake
between my legs, hit a bump, smashed the milkshake into my lap which distracted me, then I ran into
a wall, and its McD's fault..."

Tony Raven said:

I'm with Brant.

But not, it would appear, with John Forester, who describes the design as 'gross negligence'.

(JF ascribes the blame to the brake manufacturers, but I'm not convinced that this is correct - I
don't know enough about the evolution of the design, and anyway at the moment I'm nore interested in
the failings themselves rather than apportioning blame for them).

James

James Annan said:

You should have trusted your first instincts. But looking on the bright side, this does give
Brant's nonsense a public viewing rather than clogging up my mailbox.

Did you see the propsal of the word "Jobstinate" in ?rbm recently? I recognised the intent
immediately :-)

Guy
===
** WARNING ** This posting may contain traces of irony. chapmancentral.comchapmancentral.comOpen ↗ (BT ADSL and
dynamic DNS permitting)
NOTE: BT Openworld have now blocked port 25 (without notice), so old mail addresses may no longer
work. Apologies.

In "]news:[email hidden], James Annan <[email hidden]> typed:

Quoted message said:

Carlton Reid said:

I've updated the article. It's not a bit more subjective:

You should have trusted your first instincts. But looking on the bright side, this does give
Brant's nonsense a public viewing rather than clogging up my mailbox.

The difference between science and dogma is science seeks to challenge a theory which is
strengthened or dismissed on its ability to meet those challenges. Dogma dismisses and belittles
anyone who dares question it. N-rays and cold fusion both happened because people were preoccupied
with seeing manifestations of what they wanted to believe. There may or may not be something in your
theory but you do it no credit by attacking anyone who dares to question it.

</rant>

Tony

--
raven-family.comraven-family.comOpen ↗

"All truth goes through three steps: First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed.
Finally, it is accepted as self-evident." Arthur Schopenhauer

James Annan said:

Quoted message said:

I'm with Brant.

Quoted message said:

But not, it would appear, with John Forester, who describes the design as 'gross negligence'.

Forester, though, was by his own admission instrumental in the introduction of the execrable "lawyer
lips" which are so completely pointless on any rim-braked fork. Not that this dimishes his status as
a "small god" in the bicycle firmament; but he is after all a <whisper>lawyer</whisper>.

Guy
===
** WARNING ** This posting may contain traces of irony. chapmancentral.comchapmancentral.comOpen ↗ (BT ADSL and
dynamic DNS permitting)
NOTE: BT Openworld have now blocked port 25 (without notice), so old mail addresses may no longer
work. Apologies.

In "]news:[email hidden], Just zis Guy, you know?
<[email hidden]> typed:

Quoted message said:

James Annan said:

You should have trusted your first instincts. But looking on the bright side, this does give
Brant's nonsense a public viewing rather than clogging up my mailbox.

Did you see the propsal of the word "Jobstinate" in ?rbm recently? I recognised the intent
immediately :-)

I think that's Brant (Richards) not (Jobst) Brandt that James is refering to.

Tony

--
raven-family.comraven-family.comOpen ↗

"All truth goes through three steps: First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed.
Finally, it is accepted as self-evident." Arthur Schopenhauer

Tony Raven said:

I think that's Brant (Richards) not (Jobst) Brandt that James is refering to.

If he's reading this or goggles himself, did he used to work for us at TWG/Freewheel in the 80's?

--
Andy Morris

AndyAtJinkasDotFreeserve.Co.UK

Love this: Put an end to Outlook Express's messy quotes
home.in.tum.deoe quotefixOpen ↗