Hi From Wales and Zaskar troubles.

[smashinstella]

Hi , Just finished building and polishing a aggressor to take on the ball burnished look of a Zaskar I always wanted.

Then I go and Find an original Zaskar ball burnished and much unloved on the bay, Now i've had the bike delivered I have noticed a crack on the welds top and bottom that join the Flat rear wheel gusset to the chain stay tube :evil: . Has anyone ever found this on a zaskar before and is it salvageable? The bike Has the flat badge at the back of the seat tube and is I believe a 91/92 model with a U cable around the Seat tube, black decals with ball burnish finish.
How do i identify where the bike was made? I guess I need to read a lot on this forum any help and advice greatly appreciated.

 

[fjpshaw]

I've never heard of a crack there myself, but others may have. Think it tends to be the usual headtube that suffers on a Zaskar. Large black decals would be correct for an early model ("Zaskar" written up the down tube, and "All Terra GT" on the top tube in black/red), and would have U-brake back then too. The easiest way to tell what year is to look at the serial number stamped into one of the rear dropout. Should be an eight digit code, the first four will tell you the month and year of manufacture. A Zaskar will also have "6061" stamped into the dropout. As far as I know, Zaskars were all made in Santa Ana back then.

 

[smashinstella]

Re:

please see attached file

 

[fjpshaw]

Crikey! Clearly a defective weld, maybe improper heat, under prepped edges, etc. But whatever the cause, if that is the case top and bottom, I'd say it's pretty fatal. I wouldn't want to be riding that under load, or putting much shock/stress through it. Have you opened an eBay dispute?

 

[smashinstella]

Not yet Gonna email him first, Anyone with experience of rewelding? I'm guessing it's retrievable to a decent welder

 

[SEANSTEPHENS]

Re:

That's a dead frame for sure. Either scrap metal or wall art

Does it have BLEM marked on the dropouts?

 

[fjpshaw]

A good welder won't have much trouble gouging out the existing weld and running a new one, but welding aluminium can be a bit tricky, and heat tolerances need to be fairly spot on (you've already seen what can happen with too much heat), so you really do want someone knows what they are doing rather than just any old guy that fancies his chances with it. By all means, look into finding someone who can properly repair, but seeing as you can pick up a Zaskar frame for under £100, my guess is it won't be viable.

 

[legrandefromage]

Its on the rear chain stay that makes it such an odd place for it to fail. Its very unusual for a Zaskar to crack - it seems that only those that had massive forks fitted and big air types cracked theirs. That looks like something has hit it to cause that sort of failure - its repairable and theres someone on the site that may want to do it, if he's not too busy.

 

[02gf74]

Crikey. Is that the original weld or has it been repaired.

Least troublesome and probably cheapest/safest solution is to return and source another frame.

 

[danson67]

I'd agree that it looks like a welding fault. 6061 is particularly prone to hot cracking as the weld cools.
This looks like a case, on an external corner joint, combined with a bit of buckling of the dropout plate.

It's not one of the more stressed parts of the frame, so I don't see any problem with a clean repair there.
Cut out the old fillet and run a fresh line.
PM me if you don't resolve things with the original seller.

All the best,