Originally Posted by
Jeff Wills
Yes they can, but the issue with "self-extracting" crankarm bolts is that people rarely tighten them enough. Once the crankarm gets loose and the machining at the spindle interface gets boogered, it's all over. You have to replace the crankarm.
My bikes don't have Octalink cranks, but one of them is my travel bike that requires removal of the crankarm to fit inside a regular suitcase. It has a self-extracting bolt on a regular square-taper crank and that's been used dozens of times when packing the bike. I don't really see why the self-extracting nature of it has anything to do with how tight I get it when reinstalling the crank. I'd use the same torque when tightening it regardless of whether I used a separate extractor tool to take it off or used the self-extracting bolt - but the latter certainly makes it quicker and more convenient to take the crank off when packing the bike.