Ok so in a rather predictable move I decided to go with blue housing AND blue tape. And then I loaded the bike up to take for a shakedown ride on the local MUP. We get to the MUP and I take off like a bullet! This bike feels so light and nimble and then I notice a little wobbliness? in the pedals. So I stop and check the bottom bracket and it’s completely loose! So then I walk, coast my way back to the car (which was a lot farther than I thought it was because I never walk this path) and I get home and this is what I find


the fixed cup came loose! I’ve actually never had this happen, I’ve never even removed a fixed cup…

So I tightened it as much as I could … which is maybe not enough, not sure how to do it to the right torque honestly, I’ve never installed a fixed cup on a bottom bracket before… and then I adjusted the other side, got it where it needs to be. But now I’m wondering what happened….
I will say I didn’t use my torque wrench like I usually do when installing the crank arms, I was being lazy and used what I thought was about the same amount of pressure I use every other time with the torque wrench, but maybe the crank arms were a little loose. Also, and this is a big one, I didn’t check the adjustable cup at all, I just assumed it was on there tight because I checked for play at one point when the crank arms were on and I didn’t feel anything so I assumed everything was tightened up ….. so now I’m feeling kind of dumb for this and I’m hoping I haven’t done any damage to the bottom bracket…. 😬.

I haven’t put the crank arms back on yet because I want to make sure the fixed cup is tight enough first but when I do I will definitely be using the torque wrench! And yeah, I probably should always be checking the bottom bracket lock ring and adjustable cup for looseness before riding a new bike too, that’s something else I’ll definitely be doing going forward.

I still did manage to get a few glamour shots of my bike on my ride though, because you know, priorities




I was planning on posting these to the bikes on bridges thread but my husband says I can’t because this was on an isthmus so I guess I’ll post them here. She sure is purrty!