Trek Madone Toptube Repair

Toptube damages are of our most common repairs on carbon fiber bikes and for a number of reasons. Top tubes are of the thinnest areas on the bike, both for weight and vibration reduction, so they’re already vulnerable on a material level. However, many of the damages we see to this area are work stand and not crash related. Yep, you read that correctly: many people still crush top tubes using a bike work stand clamp.

The image above illustrates how far the clamp damage has radiated out into the frame. This Trek Madone is a particularly interesting example: the top tubes are already thinly laid, but the non-round, aerodynamic shaping makes it even more difficult to clamp properly with a conventional work stand. We found the damage using our ultrasound machine, which is accurate at finding damage in the laminate to within .001mm.


Our next step is the damage removal process where we taper sand into the laminate, removing any and all of the damage carbon fibers. This is one of the most crucial steps to repair: if the damaged fiber is left and repaired over you’ll have cracks continue to propagate even under a new repair, and if you sand away too much material you’ll create a new failure point.

The above image shows all of the damage removed from the top tube of this Madone. Fully cleaned, this frame is now ready for stabilization and the final repair layup.

As you can see, we first added a layer of twill carbon to help stabilize the area before we added three layers of unidirectional fiber. With only a little bit of wet sanding, this frame is totally safe and ready to ride but will first be sent to paint. Beautiful as is, isn’t it? Wait until you see the paint match.

Our painter adds a layer of primer and then hand matches all the paint to be applied. We choose to hand mix all paints in-house, as it cuts down on turn time and is far more accurate than relying on factory paint codes, for a number of reasons: paint color drifts from batch to batch, paint weathers differently, and often manufacturers do not even know the paint info. There’s no universal matching solution, so we rely on individual matching for each frame.


You’re looking at the final result. All paint matched, both the top matte black and the bottom matte red. We also fully matched and recreated the top “Madone” decals as well. No details spared. From the ultrasound scan to final paint, we take every step necessary to repair your frame back to its original glory. That’s Remade in the USA.