Thread: Squeaking BB
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Old 05-09-05 | 01:37 PM
  #5  
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shants
roll'em high
 
Joined: Feb 2005
Posts: 2,391
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From: columbus, ohio
on the '05 pista, the sugino rd cranks sit very very close to the cups due to the short 103mm bottom bracket. this means that a ton of crap will invariably get caught between the cups and the crank arms which, for me, has caused a lot of weird grinding and other nastiness that has nothing to do with any part failure. of course, i've never had any creaking. generally, my assumption with front drive-train creaking is that your crank (or, possibly, chainring) bolts are slightly lose. i'd say that you should take off the cranks, clean out the cups, and, as suggested, make sure that they are tight -- drive side is left threaded). before putting your cranks back on, i would advise (re)greasing the tapers and then making sure that the crank bolts are nice and tight when you put the cranks back on. a word of warning -- don't go too tight on the bolts... i just broke off a bolt in my bottom bracket from cranking the hell out of mine with a cheater bar. not a good idea.

if you do all of this to no avail, you will need a new 103mm square taper bottom bracket (JIS taper.. this is important). the only one that i've found that is the FSA ultimax CrMo 68x103mm. It's a nice sealed cart bottom bracket and is only $34.00+s/h from www.aebike.com. The narrowest that the Shimano 53 or 73 model bottom brackets come in is 107mm. You can also find 103mm bottom brackets that have the campy-style taper. i would avoid those, but you may find some who use them with success. the FSA bottom bracket is nice, i use one.
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