Bicycle Mechanics - Pulling a crank without the help of a puller

So my fixie frame died tonight and now I'm stripping off all the salvageable components. I've got everything off but the crankset. Bolts are out, but of course it's rather firmly seated on the BB spindle. I'm wondering if there's any workable way to remove a crankset without the help of a crankset puller, which I do not have at my disposal at the moment. Of course, had I the right tool for the job at my disposal, I wouldn't *need* to fudge it, but I don't and if the crankset gets messed up a little in the process no big deal, so I'm open to ideas.

So if you found yourself on a desert island and your evil captor refused to take you back to civilization until you took the crankset off an old bike, and you had all the tools you could think of outside of a crank puller, how would you do it?

Just ride it around a bit, it will fall off. Don't go too far from home.

Well if I needed to get the cranks off and didn't care about them, I would knock the hell out of them with a four pound short handled sledge (I like the Estwing) as close to the BB as I could.

If I had every tool available, and had to save them, I would use a flush bearing puller to pop them off.

The right thing to do is wait until tomorrow, get a crank puller (That you will use many times over the years) and pop it off that way. I would get the Campy tool and the Shimano 105 tool for splined cranks. Good to go.

I'd ride it, but the frame is literally broken - downtube detatched from the head tube. I guess I'll call around tomorrow and see if anyone locally has any crank pullers in stock.

Maybe you should point your stereo at it and cue up "waiting room" on repeat :)

Hehe. Unfortunately, I don't think my bike is indie enough for that to work. :p

a puller can be had for under $15 and is a good investment.

I like that song. 1 of 13 I like on that album. What was it called again?

Fugazi Dave, it is a FIXED, how more independent or underground can it get? Unicycle?

Mkrg, I think you can figure it out :)

i have repeater +2 songs....i remain unimpressed with most of the album..."waiting room" and "repeater" are good songs though...

i used to use a bigass rubber mallet to knock **** loose...but a park crank puller can be bought for like, $12-$15....and as the right rev. said, WELL worth it.

Knock a hardwood wedge between the chain stay and crank as close to the bb as possible. Tap the opposite side of the crank to get it to come off evenly.

Hope this helps.

I tried riding with the bolts out once and one fell off in the first couple of miles but the other refused to come off even after about 50 miles. I used a sawzall to saw almost all the way through and then it came off. Works good if you are careful and don't care what happens to the crank.

I tried riding with the bolts out once and one fell off in the first couple of miles but the other refused to come off even after about 50 miles. I used a sawzall to saw almost all the way through and then it came off. Works good if you are careful and don't care what happens to the crank. It woulda been cheaper to buy a crank puller, given the number of times it can be reused (virtually forever), the wear on the recip saw motor, the use of the blade, and the time taken to do it.

I like that song. 1 of 13 I like on that album. What was it called again?

Whoa, crazy. Mine only has 7 songs.

Does your desert island have a LBS? :)

I took my fixie to my LBS 'cuz I didn't have a crank puller and they removed it for free. It's really weird how some people treat you differently when they discovered you're riding a fixie. The mech. asked me if I was building a fixie and I said, "yes". He then pulled off the cranks and gave me back my frame and cranks and said, "Here you go." A friend of mine took his mountain bike to the same LBS to swap out his pedals and they charged him $5. Go figure. Perhaps they will do it free for you.

Called the guys at Performance, they didn't have any in stock but said they'd pull it for me for like $5. I figured why not. So I go down, and they remove the crank and BB for me, and then don't charge me anything because I gave them the frame (it's broken, what do I need it for?). Cool guys.

13 Songs is a decidedly kick*ss album. Not for everyone, but that just means it helps single out those who are in the know. :-)

And as for my bike not being indie enough, I don't think any bike will be indie enough now that I've seen a guy riding down the street here in Chicago that's double high. Like 2 bikes stacked on one another so the seat is like 6 or 7 feet up in the air. Now that is indie. I just want to know how he gets on and off the thing...