You may have seen at the recent UCI Road Cycling World Championships how a rider in the junior race crashed due to a broken fork steerer tube.

Not much information has been released of the cause, however it has been suggested that the bike may have been damaged due to coming off the team car during the TT.

See the article at: http://velonews.competitor.com/2015/09/news/broken-steerer-at-worlds-likely-due-to-prior-crash_386664.

We see lots of forks with damage to the steerer when performing our carbon bike assessments, almost 2 out of 3 forks we scan has a fault or some form of damage.

Sometimes the damage is visible such as a crack due to overtightening of the stem or the incorrect fit of the compression plug.

In other cases the damage only shows up in the Ultrasound scan, such as a delamination from an overload or porosity/voids during manufacture.
Incorrect cutting of the steerer when fitting the fork can also cause a delamination which may then grow over time.
In some cases the manufacturer has become aware of the production fault and recalled the fork, we have a link to the recall pages here.

Either way, this damage can cause a sudden failure, posibly resulting in serious injury.

The photo shows a fork that showed no visual signs of damage, however the area marked in yellow was delaminated, severely limiting its structural capacity.

We recommend regular inspection of this critical area, and the use of torque wrenches during assembly. If your bike has been involved in a crash or impact, such as on the car roof rack, we can assess the bike for any signs of damage with our Ultrasound scan.

In most cases fork steerer damage can be repaired making the fork fully functional and safe again.

If you have any doubts over the safety of you bike get it checked out