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Old 08-17-13 | 07:58 PM
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volosong
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Joined: Apr 2011
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From: North Idaho

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Creaky Crank, is it the bottom bracket?

Was on a century ride yesterday and part way into it, I noticed creaks coming from the crank area. At first, I thought is was the chain rubbing against the front dérailleur. But, a visual inspection showed this to not be the case. It happened on both chainrings, more so on the large ring, (being a flatish route, I really didn't use the small chainring very much).

The creaks got worse and worse as the ride progressed. And, seem to be the loudest when I was applying increased power, such as pulling a hill. A few times when I just freewheeled, without applying hardly power to the pedals, the noise was pretty much gone. I did notice early in the ride, there was not much noise, but when I stood on the pedals to get over a little rise, it creeked until I crested the hill, sat down, and resumed normal pedaling. I have not noticed any creeking on previous rides, or if I did, I assumed it was chain rubbing against the FD.

The only thing I can think of is that the creeks emanate from the bottom bracket. It's a fairly new bike, Strava shows I've put just 721.0 miles on it. It is a Pinarello FP Team that I purchased from Competitive Cyclist. It was built up with Ultegra 6700. The only changes I've made that might affect the noise is changing the crank from a 53/39 to a 50/34, (it was a new, unused crankset), and adding a K-Edge chain catcher. I do not know what manufacturer of the bottom bracket the bike has and would have to pull the crank to find out if it is a Shimano or a MOst.

Any ideas?

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p.s. I lubed the chain the morning before the ride.

Last edited by volosong; 08-17-13 at 08:05 PM.
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