Seat post fused into seat tube.

[NickM]

You might like to try this stuff. It's inexpensive and has worked for some people, at least. I have a friend's bike which needs the job doing, and have obtained some Super Crack, to be sprayed in copious amounts through the seat tube bottle cage braze-ons as a first plan of attack. Two minutes later, the seatpin should just slide out... I am told. I'll let you all know if it works - if not, it will be the hacksaw approach!

 

[Zippy]

SuperCrack spray? Looks like WD40 to me??

Your idea of through the drink bottle braze-ons gives me an idea though - maybe squirting caustic soda trough the same with the bike upside down and the seat stem plugged may enable the stem to be chemically burned out?

My lbs technician tells me my seat tube is truly fused in the frame and nothing but hacking or sawing will remove it. They tried with another guy's bike and they hacked and drilled it out and it took ages and not without dents to the seat tube. It sounds like I could do better myself!

 

[hubgearfreak]

didn't know they could do that. what do they charge labour per hour? seems a bit steep, even if £ 30 then that is over 2 hours - if they have the right tool then it shoudl be 15 min job at most. dunno.

great. so you've gone from not knowing the technique existed to knowing how long it should take in the time it took you to compose a sentence. brilliant.

two hours doesn't seem too unreasonable to me. it's a ballache of a job

 

[NickM]

SuperCrack spray? Looks like WD40 to me??

No, because it is not only a penetrating oil, but also freezes the area. Environmentally nasty stuff, according to the words on the can - so likely to be effective, I hope...

 

[Zippy]

Just googling around the problem.

How about caustic soda solution to dissolve the seat post? Apparently this would not affect the CroMo or steel frame?

Another suggestion was oven cleaner (again, caustic) squirted down the seat tube and then hang upside down (to keep the solution on the aluminium) with the seat tube plugged.

Leave until the aluminium just wafts away in the breeze - about 30 years!

 

[Amanda P]

It's my experience that caustic soda doesn't really do much to dissolve aluminium - but it will help to dissolve the aluminium oxide gunk that is probably doing the jamming.

My approach was to mix up some strong caustic solution, wedge open the seat tube as much as possible, then trickle some solution (from a syringe) down the crack between seat tube and seat pin. Go to work. On return, clamp seat pin stump in vice and swing on bike frame.

Repeat every day for two weeks - eventual success. It may have helped that mine was a fluted seatpost, so I could squirt stuff down the grooves. Then again, this allowed salty water to get down there in the first place and cause the corrosion...

If/when you get it out, bear in mind Dodgy's advice:

Ladies and Gentlemen of the class of '97, Grease your seatpost. If I could offer you only one tip for the future, greasing your seatpost would be it. The long term benefits of greasing your seatpost have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience....

 

[Amanda P]

Oh, and I have most of a bottle of caustic soda you can have if you want it. But you can buy it in B&Q and such places, where it's sold as drain cleaner.

Please be very, very careful with it. Read the instructions. It's nasty stuff. (I used to clean breweries with it once upon a time...)

 

[jeltz]

FWIW he tried several of the suggestions but in the end took the bike to Argos who used a torch to free it, there is a bit of damage to the paint work and he may have to have the frame resprayed.

 

[jeltz]

Duct tape is working prety well at the moment

 

[chriswoody]

I'm suprised no ones mentioned Plus Gas:

http://http://www.lawson-his.co.uk/scripts/details.php?cat=Penetrating Oils&product=30700. It's a penetrating oil available from DIY shops.

I got my alloy seat tube stuck in my steel framed Galaxy and a few days of pouring this down the seat tube, (after having removed the BB), plus a lot of twisting and pulling, freed it with no damage to anything.

Lesson learnt about regulary removing and greasing the post with copper slip!

 

[02GF74]

great. so you've gone from not knowing the technique existed to knowing how long it should take in the time it took you to compose a sentence. brilliant.

two hours doesn't seem too unreasonable to me. it's a ballache of a job

I used my imagination

 

[hubgearfreak]

an electric paint stripper /heater would have caused less damage I expect but then ***** are predominently frame restorers and finishers so they would know that there would be a high probability of getting subsequent work if the paintwork was damaged.

are you suggesting that they used more heat than was necessary to deliberately damage the paint?
that's libel, and i'd expect the mods to delete and warn you.

as for the company involved, i'd guess that painting an old frame isn't a very profitable activity, i'm certain that they wouldn't risk their reputation for a few quids worth of hard, skilled work.

 

[PpPete]

i'd guess that painting an old frame isn't a very profitable activity

Don't guess - look at their website...... would venture to suggest that at those price it would not take long to recover their investment in equipment and thereafter be in to a good profit generator.

 

[NickM]

"If I could offer you only one tip for the future, greasing your seatpost would be it."

Mine would be to ride a recumbent - no seatpin problems then!

 

[NickM]

...Lesson learnt about regulary removing and greasing the post with copper slip!

Less than ideal between steel and alloy - plain grease would be preferable.