nitropowered

My IRO Mark V fixed gear frame came in today.

I noticed that the steerer tube on the fork is painted.

Should I sand off all the paint?

What grit sand paper should I use? 800? 1600? wet? dry? 0, 00, 000 steelwool?

juicemouse

Is it painted all the way up the steerer? If it's threaded, don't worry about it. If it's threadless, use some type of paint stripper or thinner instead of sanding.

nitropowered

Its threadless.

Whoever painted this did a bad job masking. Theres a 2-3 inch unpainted section by the crown, then a bout a foot of paint, then 2-3in of unpainted.

juicemouse

Sounds sloppy, but might not actually be a problem. If you can get both the crown race and the top race on without touching the paint, you're good to go.

nitropowered

I can get the crown race on w/o it touching paint, but the top race would be touching. The paint is actually smoother than the metal itself.

I just tried thinner and it doesn't seem to have any effect on the paint.

juicemouse

For the top race, I'd either "upgrade" to aircraft stripper or just use an abrasive like steel wool or a wire brush or sandpaper. You're not going to hurt anything up there unless you really go nuts.

jhota

sounds like powdercoat, not paint then.

phidauex

I wouldn't worry about it, honestly. Most forks are quasi painted like that, and they install fine. If you DO remove the paint, remember to grease it up so it won't rust.

peace,
sam

shane45

Uhhhh....I wouldn't suggest putting grease on the stearer tube - especially at the top end where the stem is.

sydney

Ever notice how tightly a greased seatpost gets clamped?

roadfix

no arguement there....

shane45

Ever notice the number of people complaining about their seatpost slipping?

juicemouse

That's got absolutely nothing to do with greasing it or not. That's caused by a weak clamp, usually a poorly designed quick release. It can also be an incorrect seatpost size for the frame.

CRUM

Sure I have. But after 17 years in the business I have noticed more than a few frozen seatposts because no grease was used. Not counting carbon posts, in the scheme of whether or not to grease a post or not, I will always grease them. Nothing I hate more than telling a customer I have to ruin their $100 seat post in order to save their $1500 bike.

As far as the steerer and paint goes. IMO, the paint only matters if it is restricting the clean assembly of the headset parts. If paint needs to be removed, do it carefully and evenly. Greasing it or not should have no effect on it's performance.

jester69

So, why does no-one use anti sieze instead of grease on seatposts, Other than possibly getting sliver schmutz on your hands when you adjust it. Antisizeze (graphite or otherwise) will prevent sticking much better than grease, and will continue to work even if it dries out!

Jester

roadfix

Simple......that's because most people readily have available some kind of grease in their tool box, and rather use what they already have than go out and buy anti-seize compound.

jester69

That is a good point.

Since I already have various sizes of Vice Grips I don't need a pedal wrench, spoke wrench or really any other sort of wrench.

Since I already have elmers glue I don't need to buy any loctite.

You would save me a lot of money if I wasn't the kind of guy to use the best tool for the job. As for having stuff in the house, I have about 3 small tubes and 2 pint containers of graphite based Antisieze laying around from working on cars. if you are not similarly inclined, a small tube costs very little.

I was more asking if there was any reason I shouldn't use it that I hadn't thought of. On cars greasing something does absolutely no good. If you don't antisieze it, you will have a stuck bolt when you get back to it.

From what I have read Ti-Prep is just antisieze anyway, so i'm sure its OK to use antisieze on my seatpost.

take care,

Jester

panguinfreak

well fix it then