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Following the worldwide furore over James Annan’s theory that – in certain circumstances – wheels can be be ejected from some disc-brake equipped bikes, the CPSC recommended that the ASTM Bicycle Committee, which
was to meet at Interbike should "take this matter under advisement for further discussion, additional testing and problem examination."
Cannondale engineer Mark LaPlant was asked to supply a report for this meeting.
ASTM Committee meetings are open to the public and interested parties may contact the committee chair to
be included on the agenda. All well and good. But James Annan and Carlton Reid of BikeBiz.com, both of whom have been in correspondence with CPSC officials over the wheel ejection theory, were not informed of the meeting far enough in advance to be able to attend the meeting. Annan was told only when Interbike was already in progress. BikeBiz.com was not contacted at all, despite being at Interbike and able to attend the meeting.
Annan sees significance in the late arrival of the meeting notification.
In an email to the CPSC, he wrote:
"I’d always prefer to assume a cock-up rather than a conspiracy but it seems difficult to avoid the conclusion that someone was keen to ensure that I did not find out about the ASTM meeting until it was too late for this information to be of any value.
In any case, I would be most interested in seeing a copy of the report that Mark LaPlant of Cannondale apparently produced for you, demonstrating that a properly fastened QR cannot loosen off. As you must be well aware, this runs contrary to much experimental, theoretical and anecdotal evidence, so it must be a very interesting piece of research. Since his report was presented at the ASTM meeting, open to the public in theory if not in practice, I do not anticipate that he can have any objection to it being placed in the public domain, and look forward to your earliest response."
BikeBiz.com has contacted Cannondale to see if the company will release the report.
To find all the news stories on this site about the wheel ejection theory, type ‘Annan’ in the search engine box at the top left of the page.
