ChrisEyles
Guru
- Location
- Devon
I've been tinkering about with a new MTB recently - got a pretty good deal on it but it needed quite a lot of work. The entire drive train was pretty much shot to hell, covered in gunky gunge and sharks fin teeth all over the place.
Fitting the new cassette and chain were no problem, but while swapping the crankset I noticed the BB was also in need of replacement, so I bought a removal tool and thought I'd stick in a new one while I'm at it (I did consider "upgrading" to hollowtech but would have required buying new tools and I've heard mixed opinions of whether it's actually an improvement over square taper... plus I'd already sourced another bargain on a crankset by this point anyway).
Non drive side lock ring came out no problems, but the drive side BB unit threads seemed to have seized in the frame, and I couldn't shift them for love nor money.
Incidentally, why on earth do they make the splines on the BB so shallow??? While holding that damn tool in place and applying serious torque to a spanner I'm sure I'm not the only one who's ended up with skinned knuckles!
Was clearly getting nowhere, even with an extension bar on the spanner, so I clamped the BB removal tool good and hard in the bench vise, and used the frame as a lever to undo the BB. Required bracing my body weight pretty hard against the seat post and made a pretty good "crack", but wasn't as difficult as I thought it might be.
I've since googled and seen this is a known issue and trick to resolve it, but just thought I'd put it up on here in case anyone has the same problem and access to a bench vise and finds it while searching the forum.... OK and to gloat a little to myself that I didn't have to end up going cap in hand to the LBS
My smugness was marred a little, as when I went to fit my new dropper post (easily the most extravagant thing I've ever bought for a bike despite it being the cheapest one I could find) I realised I'd got the wrong size >
Fortunately it's a 30.9mm post and a 31.6mm frame so I've got a shim in the post to fit it later on.
Fitting the new cassette and chain were no problem, but while swapping the crankset I noticed the BB was also in need of replacement, so I bought a removal tool and thought I'd stick in a new one while I'm at it (I did consider "upgrading" to hollowtech but would have required buying new tools and I've heard mixed opinions of whether it's actually an improvement over square taper... plus I'd already sourced another bargain on a crankset by this point anyway).
Non drive side lock ring came out no problems, but the drive side BB unit threads seemed to have seized in the frame, and I couldn't shift them for love nor money.
Incidentally, why on earth do they make the splines on the BB so shallow??? While holding that damn tool in place and applying serious torque to a spanner I'm sure I'm not the only one who's ended up with skinned knuckles!
Was clearly getting nowhere, even with an extension bar on the spanner, so I clamped the BB removal tool good and hard in the bench vise, and used the frame as a lever to undo the BB. Required bracing my body weight pretty hard against the seat post and made a pretty good "crack", but wasn't as difficult as I thought it might be.
I've since googled and seen this is a known issue and trick to resolve it, but just thought I'd put it up on here in case anyone has the same problem and access to a bench vise and finds it while searching the forum.... OK and to gloat a little to myself that I didn't have to end up going cap in hand to the LBS
My smugness was marred a little, as when I went to fit my new dropper post (easily the most extravagant thing I've ever bought for a bike despite it being the cheapest one I could find) I realised I'd got the wrong size >
Fortunately it's a 30.9mm post and a 31.6mm frame so I've got a shim in the post to fit it later on.
