Case Study
Leinfelden-Echterdingen,
April 14, 2025

Safe cycling

Non-destructive quality assurance for carbon parts in cycling.
More and more bicycle manufacturers are realizing the benefits of thermographic testing: it helps detect material defects and component failures, preventing serious accidents and ensuring compliance with customers’ high quality expectations. Defective parts and faulty processes can be identified automatically and non-destructively – whether during development through laboratory testing, during production via sampling test stations, or in large-scale manufacturing using inline inspection systems with short cycle times. edevis brings extensive experience in the bicycle industry. Thermography is particularly valuable when it comes to defects that remain hidden from the naked eye – often concealed within the interior of a component.

Project Description

Motivation

Unlike in the aerospace or automotive industries, safety testing is not mandatory in bicycle manufacturing – yet it can prevent injuries that are just as severe or even fatal in the event of a failure. Some manufacturers only begin to take product safety seriously after an incident has occurred – when a faulty component has already caused harm to a customer or employee. But by then, it’s often too late. To ensure road safety, bicycle owners and riders must comply with regulations such as the UVV, DGUV or StVZO. For manufacturers, voluntary quality control is highly advisable – and in their own best interest: costly and reputation-damaging recalls can often be avoided. Bicycle manufacturers greatly benefit from the quality assurance solutions provided by edevis – gaining safer products, reduced liability risks, and increased customer trust.

Challenge

The task is clearly in the area of quality assurance. And in bicycle production, quality starts where visual inspection reaches its limits: inside the parts. It involves completely testing bicycle components for strength-relevant defects in the material or in the workmanship. This applies in particular to hand-made carbon components such as frames, handlebars or rims, which are tested for delaminations, impacts, pores, dry areas or fiber undulations. With thermographic testing systems, we penetrate bicycle parts without destruction and identify faults and irregularities in depth. These systems help to set up development, processes and series production without errors. Manufacturing processes in the bicycle industry are subject to many influencing factors, which can cause process fluctuations again and again. For example when manufacturing carbon rims. There is a forming tool for the outer contour and an inflatable inner part, which easily “folds” and the CFRP prepregs are then not pressed properly during the curing process. This leads to delaminations in the layer structure. edevis can identify these invisible defects based on thermal contrasts and sort out critical parts before they reach final assembly and possibly even go on sale.

Solution

In bicycle component testing, edevis uses so-called lockin thermography testing with infrared cameras and halogen lamp excitation. The component surface is briefly confronted with heat while the camera records the heat flow behavior. The software evaluates the test results and sorts parts into “Not OK” and “OK.” The lightweight construction of bicycle parts with hollow profiles ensures thin-walled components that can be examined very well via heat stimulation. Material defects can be clearly detected based on changed heat flows, especially at junctions where several profiles are connected.

Implementation

Projects usually start with the request and delivery of faulty parts (handlebars, frame, rims, saddle, etc.) as well as at least one fault-free reference part. The specification of the test procedure (delaminations, pores, cracks, damage after use, positions of inserts, etc.) then begins. The feasibility study and budgeting complete this phase. It is then implemented, either directly with the customer, if in-house equipment manufacturing is available, or together with a plant manufacturer. In addition, edevis also provides turnkey systems for laboratories or random testing.

FAQ

Our frequently asked questions — answered quickly and easily.

All questions/answers

How deep can active thermography 'look' into a component?

Is the evaluation of the thermograms complicated?

What is the difference between passive and active thermography?

When is active thermography more sensible than passive?

Which materials can be tested with active thermography?