Actually from my experience the real benefit of carbon is strength rather than light weight. And because, unlike aluminum, the material has no memory, it isn't struggling to retain its shape. Have you ever potato chipped a rim? That doesn't happen with carbon. And I'm not sure about your point with flexibility as it relates to strength. Flex relates most to the shape of the structure while the strength in terms of impact resistance is related to the material that is likely to impact the ground. As far as Kazimer breaking one goes, did you think Santa Cruz was saying they are indestructible? He clearly stated that other rims would have broken under the same impact and that it was rider error. Things break. Will these break less than others in the real world? That remains to be seen. It would be great if your average rider could get statistics on failures the way we can about vehicles but alas that isn't possible. You can talk to bike shop employees but they have their own biases.
June 5, 2017, 10:03 p.m. - Cam McRae
Actually from my experience the real benefit of carbon is strength rather than light weight. And because, unlike aluminum, the material has no memory, it isn't struggling to retain its shape. Have you ever potato chipped a rim? That doesn't happen with carbon. And I'm not sure about your point with flexibility as it relates to strength. Flex relates most to the shape of the structure while the strength in terms of impact resistance is related to the material that is likely to impact the ground. As far as Kazimer breaking one goes, did you think Santa Cruz was saying they are indestructible? He clearly stated that other rims would have broken under the same impact and that it was rider error. Things break. Will these break less than others in the real world? That remains to be seen. It would be great if your average rider could get statistics on failures the way we can about vehicles but alas that isn't possible. You can talk to bike shop employees but they have their own biases.