Need Bottom Bracket? advice
I need some advice with a problem my mountain bike (trek 8000 bought in 2003) is having. It makes an unfriendly noise when I pedal. It isn’t a grinding sound and I can best describe it as a mechanical groan. At first, I only heard it after I had been riding a while, like 20 or 30 minutes, as if it was after things warmed up. Now it starts right away. It groans only when I am climbing and only when I am pushing the right crank.
I have changed pedals, made sure my front derailer wasn’t dragging, and put on a new chain. Once on a different bike I had a weird noise and it turned out to be the seat post but that doesn’t seem to be the case now; I removed the seat post, rode it up a hill and still heard the agonizing groan. It sounds like it comes from the crank or bottom bracket. I removed the bottom bracket and it turned freely, although there was a hint of powdered metal on it. Also, I couldn’t get the left bottom bracket adapter off but was able to remove it from the right side. I am wondering if this will be a problem if I put a new one on.
I am most suspicious of the bottom bracket mainly because the groan seems to come from there. The BB was marked TRUVATIV Model # BB-03-SPL-SL-113-68(E)/73. I checked the TRUVATIV web site and it appears this model is not available. The best I could tell was a newer model GigaPipe Team SL BB, ISIS-68+E/73x113mm would work.
I would appreciate comments telling if this sounds like a bottom bracket problem or what it might be. And if I get a new BB