Originally Posted by
Andrew Duff
I am hoping somebody can assist me with this. I have a COLNAGO CT1 Titanium. It is older bike ~2002 I think. I generally love the ride, feel, handling of the bike, but recently in the last couple of months it has produced a truely nasty grinding/growning sound from the bottom bracket area. I ride with a large group most saturdays - everyone can hear it. I have replaced the grease in the BB twice, it is ok for only a few days and then returns. My LBS says it is "common to Titanium frames" and it is the sound of the Titanium BB thread on the Aluminium of the BB cups. Can anyone confirm this is true? Can I do anything about it? LBS says "nothing you can do it will always return" therefore "would you like to buy this carbon frame"?? Can anyone help?
FWIW I have 5 Ti frames, and have run at least 6 different BB/crank configurations. I've had noise in the BB area on several occations.
First off, this is not always a BB problem. I've had lose crank bolts, loose pedals, bad bearing in the pedal, loose crank bolt, and finally loose/dirty BB interface.
I would try going through every bolt on the bike with a torque wrench and make sure they are all tight. The deal with a Ti bike is the metal is harmonic (or whatever) and can make small noises louder and make it hard to find where they are coming from. If torquing all the bolts does not due the trick Remove the BB and clean the threads on both the BB and the frame. I mean REally clean. A single grain of sand or grit can drive you bonkers making little clicking noises under load. Lastly you may have killed the bearings in your BB. They might feel smooth by hand but unerload is a different story.
my final recommendation is get a new shop. Anybody that tells you to scrap a Ti frame because they all click in the BB is a schister and cannot be trusted to fix your problem. Go spend some money on a torque wrench (actually you will need two - a big one and a small one) and fix the problem yourself.
Good luck.