Quote from: cl33 on June 25, 2026, 11:23:21 AM
A comparison with a fork from a similarly priced LongTeng frameset. Never seen a carbon job as messy as on the SP cycle. In addition my frame has bubbles in the top carbon layer in the frame comaparment and several other small defects.

SP cycle answered my mail on Monday and told me the following:
I opened a case with PayPal, let´s see.

and just like that they lost me as a potential customer lol what a terrible answer considering how AWFUL those forks look, yikes

Do spcycle forks all look like this? I can't really tell from there website, but they seem to look rough there too. I saw one other pic in a thread here, the g068?, where someone has a pic of the steerer tube and the brake cable port where it doesn't look very nice. It may be the lighting? The fork complaints are about the flip chip that this fork doesn't have.

O dont know...


Spcycle is a factory or only a Brand?

If not, different suppliers result in different qualities

Quote from: cl33 on June 25, 2026, 11:23:21 AM
A comparison with a fork from a similarly priced LongTeng frameset. Never seen a carbon job as messy as on the SP cycle. In addition my frame has bubbles in the top carbon layer in the frame comaparment and several other small defects.

SP cycle answered my mail on Monday and told me the following:
I opened a case with PayPal, let´s see.

So essentially it aint going to break. Yes it may be ugly but their structural engineer does not consider it unsafe.  It is covered when assembled and cannot be seen. Interested to see what hapoens with the PayPal claim. You'd expect their team to argue it has a 2 year warranty against failure and that this will not cause failure.

SPCycle G028 / Conti Dubnital Race 29×2.2″

There is a lot of useful information in this forum, thank you all. I'll share photos of one of our first builds. The reviews are extremely positive if anyone thinks.

a very similar frame from MEIMIER - MEINIER GLR15 / Chaoyang PHANTOM SPEED 2.2″

My site has already been mentioned here without me, if anyone is interested in details and additional information on the links.

auto translation will do a great job from any language.


MEINIER
https://velo.gravelo.ru/2026/06/30/meinier-glr15-chaoyang/

SPCycle

https://velo.gravelo.ru/2026/06/30/gravel-spcycle-g028/

Quote from: warthog on June 29, 2026, 04:29:41 PM
So essentially it aint going to break.

I assure you, this fork will fail prematurely in a fatigue test as well as under real life riding scenarios.

I also got a response vom spcycle to my fork complaint.
As expected, they either have absolutely no expertise or—more likely—they want to rip off their customers.
Maybe both.
They told me "A test specimen fork passed the impact test. It´s all fine."

Nice attempt to ignore excessive sanding in areas that shouldn't have been sanded at all.

I´m done with spcycle. I´ll open a paypal case.

Quote from: MiWi on June 30, 2026, 12:36:55 PM
I assure you, this fork will fail prematurely in a fatigue test as well as under real life riding scenarios.

You have the fork in front of you I do not. What does it look like inside the tube?
Can you explain why you are assured this fork will fail under real life riding scenarios?

As I said in an earlier post I do not see that area of the fork being under high stress. The area where the bearing sits will be under higher stress imo. That looks fine. Sure it is ugly but it doesn't appear dangerous. Not trying to argue, just that I can see the SP cycle position, which appears to be; it is insured against failure and a failure here is very unlikely. Yes, you most definitely do not want a failure there however.

Quote from: spcycle on April 29, 2026, 01:29:05 AM
https://www.sp-cycle.com/Spcycle-G028-Carbon-Gravel-Bike-Frame-700x57C-UDH-Hanger-Full-Internal-Cable-Gravel-Bicycle-Carbon-Frameset-p6993835.html

Can you explain why the forks pictured in this thread are not in danger of failure at the area of the steerer tube that appears aggressively grinded/sanded?

Based on your picture,  the lines and grooves I see show no indication of any carbon fibers being cut or impacted by the rough surface.   I do not see any grinding where the CF fibers are impacted.  The area you indicated above your red arrows are of little structural concern to me. Depending on how far below the rough ground surface the fibers are, those rough areas are not load bearing.   The carbon fiber strands/fibers and their orientation are what do the heavy work in the fork tube.  The Epoxy is fairly flexible helps distribute the loads throughout all if the CF fibers.  You don't need much epoxy above the outside of the fork tube fiber bundle to do it's job.

When I look at the image, I am more concerned with the roughness of the hole for the brake line.   I can see many rough notches around the hole. Depending on how the fork tube flexes  these rough areas around the hole could become stress propagation areas that could lead to cracks in The carbon fiber  If this was my fork, and I was stuck with it, I would very carefully smooth out the rough edges around the hole and observe it any of the small notches penetrate deeper into the fork tube.   

I would also sand down the rough areas that you indicated to a smoother surface and look for any carbon fiber strands becoming visible.  If the carbon fibers become exposed, then that rough area would become a concern.

Anyone dealing with a larger gap than usual between the head tube and first spacer despite being aligned and tightened down? Looks to be about 1mm or slightly more versus the usual .5mm of other bikes. Everything is aligned and set properly as far as I can tell with plastic spacer bumps settling in the recessed dimples in the spacer plastic above and below. I worry about headset bearing longevity with this big of a gap. Everything else looks good otherwise at this point.

Quote from: Uncle Rico on June 30, 2026, 07:55:46 PM
Anyone dealing with a larger gap than usual between the head tube and first spacer despite being aligned and tightened down? Looks to be about 1mm or slightly more versus the usual .5mm of other bikes. Everything is aligned and set properly as far as I can tell with plastic spacer bumps settling in the recessed dimples in the spacer plastic above and below. I worry about headset bearing longevity with this big of a gap. Everything else looks good otherwise at this point.

One thing to check is that the bearing angles are matched correctly.  I ran into this once and it stuck up higher just like yours.  This is one link that explains bearing angles.   It is good for everyone that builds their own bicycles to be aware of this. 

https://www.reddit.com/r/bikewrench/comments/1o434ps/using_different_bearing_angles_in_a_headset_what/

Quote from: Tijoe on June 30, 2026, 04:28:16 PM
Based on your picture,  the lines and grooves I see show no indication of any carbon fibers being cut or impacted by the rough surface. 

My fingernails tell a different story. I can lift the loose ends of the cut fibres.
The insde of the fork is messy and you can´t see a lot, because they left the bladder inside and I cant rip it out.

I´ve bought another fork to substitute the original one. Still indecided if I use that or the reinforced spcycle fork, which I´m riding at the moment. I vac-bagged a carbon patch on the spcycle fork (uniddirectional, doubled up rovings on the sides of the brake hose entry + plain weave top layer), which covers the whole area from directly above the 45° bearing seat to well above the brake line entry. (I make carbon and fibreglass parts as a hobby for 30 years and I´ve repaired carbon bicycle frames.) Theres not as much overlay of the reinforcement to the cut fibres in the area that is marked in the pictures. And I can´t monitor the area around the brakehose entry for fatigue cracks anymore. Therefore not a perfect solution. But that patch should reduce some of the stress heat spots, that are cause by the messy composite matrix in that area.

Quote from: Uncle Rico on June 30, 2026, 07:55:46 PM
Anyone dealing with a larger gap than usual between the head tube and first spacer despite being aligned and tightened down?

I got a similar gap with the Ritchey Switch headset I´m using. I glued a thicker 1.5mm rubber seal to the headset cap to close that gap.

Quote from: Tijoe on June 30, 2026, 04:28:16 PM
When I look at the image, I am more concerned with the roughness of the hole for the brake line.   I can see many rough notches around the hole. Depending on how the fork tube flexes  these rough areas around the hole could become stress propagation areas that could lead to cracks in The carbon fiber  If this was my fork, and I was stuck with it, I would very carefully smooth out the rough edges around the hole and observe it any of the small notches penetrate deeper into the fork tube.   

Your blue arrows show notches in the non structural brake hose cladding tube. That cladding tube doesn´t get any stress and a crack in that cladding tube don´t matter at all. Unlike welded joints, there is also no risk of a crack originating in the casing tube propagating into the base material.
What matters are the notches around the whole in the structural carbon. Those are stress risers and potential crack initiation points for the structural carbon. I´m well aware of all of that. This is my daily buisiness for 25 years.

I carfully sanded those notches (all of them) before apllying the carbon patch. My fibre/roving orientation took all those effects into account. Theclayup got a plain weave top layer that I carerully molded into the cladding tube. I sanded and smoothed out the transition after the curing process.
(the plain weave toplayer also takes care of deflection forces in the unidirectional fibres of the reinfiorcement and also of the shear stresses around the whole (from torsion for example))