Originally Posted by
tombc
It will still drain unless they caulked it shut, water is good at that. I've pulled enough of these out and found the small landfill in there, you could easily make it a non issue I guess.
However, any bike (especially dry weather bike) with cut outs in the BB shell is probably worth detailing monthly anyway isn't it? Every windowed BB shell I've found packed with dirt were from customers who abuse old racing bikes by commuting on them and never cleaning, fixing or installing nice parts on them etc.
The eternal quest for the maintenance free bike is Quixotic
I had assume the talk of using tape meant it would be pretty well sealed. Otherwise a sleeve keeps most stuff off the spindle, but won't really prevent junk from getting in around it.
While you can baby such a bike, there really is no reason to. Either accept that junk gets in there and clean it out when you do your overhaul, you treat the bike like it is made of paper mache.