I just rebuilt my first cup & cone caged bearing BB. I snugged the adjuster cup down to were I couldn't feel any play in the spindle, but when I put the crank arm on and tugged on it, I could feel a very slight knock. However, when I tightened the cup further, the spindle seemed to drag too much. Is it better to slightly over-tighten the adjuster cup, then ride it until the grease has distributed itself, then readjust again?

It's hard to say whether too tight or too loose is worse, neither is good. I don't like adjusting by spindle feel, it's too subjective and things like seal drag make it a tough call. Mount the right crank and tighten it normally and check for play where it's nearest the chainstay. You want to continue to tighten until there's zero detectable play.

When you think you've go it, mount the left arm and test for play by tapping or flexing the left arm and looking or feeling for a reaction in the right one. There shouldn't be any.

Are you absolutely sure that you have the cages in the right way around? It's pretty easy to get them wrong and there is no definite rule as to which way they go. I used to have myself convinced that the cone had to go in the side opposite the cage, but that's not always true. The only way to tell for sure is to examine the bearings and the cup and the cones and find the way that is obviously wrong (there will be one) and then assemble the other way. Also, if you have the bearing cages in backwards you will probably find that the cups don't screw in quite as far as they should. Finally, if you have trouble with adjustment or if you get it adjusted and after riding it appears that you have a loose spindle, there's a good chance one or both of the cages is in backwards.

Probably the best thing to do is to use loose balls -- can't get them in wrong.Sheldon had an opinion on this: https://www.sheldonbrown.com/tooltips/bbadj.html

i normally go for the very tiniest bit loose than too tight if i have to choose one. i mount the drive side crank and check for play at 3, 6, 9, and 12 o'clock. with old BBs for a variety of reasons you'll sometimes feel no play all the way around the cranks rotation except in one or two spots. you might also try new grade 25 loose ball bearings and check your cups and races...

This is what I do, although I do have to say in my opinion (and the opinion of the united bicycle institute) is that bearings should be adjusted "as smooth and possible with no play" so too tight over too loose.

In order to get proper adjustment, you have to slightly over tighten the adjustable cup. Tightening the lock ring will draw the cup out ever so slightly. If you tighten the cup just until the play dissapears, it will re appear when you tighten the lock ring. Takes a bit of fiddling some times.

I felt pretty confident that i put the cages back in the right way. Although you have me wondering now. I went by the diagram in the Jim Langley maintenance book with the exposed ball side facing outward into the cups. I'm going to take it back apart and reinspect it. I just thought of something that hadn't occurred to me before. I'm using the same caged barrings. They looked perfectly fine. However, I've read that free bearings should always be replaced because they will settle into one place and become slightly out-of-round. I suppose that would be true for caged bearings as well. I read the article by Sheldon that you linked. It was helpful. My adjuster cup rotates slightly when the lockring is tightened. I tried holding it with a pin spanner and read that Sheldon advises against that. He suggests using the "Kentucky windage" method, which I assume he means to try and judge how much the cup rotates when the lockring is tightened down and keep playing with it until it feels right. I did read something else surprising in his article. He said that if it is a decision between too tight and too loose, to error on the side of too loose, which is the opposite that is stated in Langley's book.

There were a couple of posts about too loose vs. too tight, so I went back to the Sheldon article to make sure I read it correctly:
"Bearing play is checked by trying to rock the end of the spindle up and down. Ideally, there should be no play at all, but in almost all cases, if you eliminate the play completely, the bearing will bind. If in doubt, it is better to have the bearing just a bit too loose than too tight. In my experience, only Campagnolo bottom brackets can be adjusted for no play and still turn as freely as they should." - Sheldon Brown

There are a couple of things that need to be covered here, as all of the info is not present. You said you rebuilt the BB set. If that means using the same cup, spindle and balls that may be the problem. The most critical part of an overhaul is inspection and we do not know if you did that properly.

The cups and spindle cones should be smoothly worn with absolutely no pits and the track worn by the bearings should be fairly even in width. If that is not the case then I would replace at least the components that don't meet that criteria, and in most cases the entire unit. As for the ball bearings I would NEVER reuse the same ones as they are impossible to inspect for defects and are considered sacrificial. In addition there is no reason to stay with the bearing retainer, unless you can't manage a loose ball reassembly and the cage is one of the higher quality ones that uses a full complement of 11 balls on each side. The more balls there are the less stress any one has to take and the more even will be the wear.

If the bearing surfaces pass the criteria above the odds are you can achieve a no-play adjustment that is also smooth. I agree no play is best, as the knock/impact each time you do a stroke will quickly cause problems. If you replace with a new cup/spindle set you should still go for no play for the same reason, and then check often for readjustment, as the balls will soon polish a smooth run on the new surfaces, removing a small amount of material in the process. Except for high end equipment new bearing parts always run a bit rough initially, although there should be no "catching."

If you're talking just a smigen too loose or too tight, it probably doesn't make a difference which. Too tight is probably superior from an engineering standpoint, but too loose is safer in that it'll give itself away af detectable play or a once per revolution click, motivating you to correct it. This debat won't end, and in my opinion you're looking to find the loosest zero play adjustment.

OTOH, meaningfully too tight or loose are fairly obvious and neither is acceptable, and trying to guess by spindle alone is too insensitive. Eons ago I was taught what I've come to call the Goldilocks method for adjusting bearings. First find a way to magnify play, in this case by feeling for it at he end of a mounted crank. Then if your sure there's play it's too lose, if you're absolutely sure there's no play it's too loose, but if you not sure if you can feel play or not it's perfect.

We had a discussion about this a couple weeks or maybe a month or so ago and I posted some pics of a Campagnolo spindle and caged bearing:



Here it is with the exposed balls facing out (towards the cup) and the caged part against the cone. This is the wrong way around for this BB -- you can see that the balls are prevented from contacting the cone:



Now, here it is the other way around (correct way for this BB, but not for every BB):



This particular spindle and caged bearing are early 70s Campagnolo GS. I recently did a mid 80s Bianchi with a Campagnolo Triomphe crank (and I assume BB) and that was the same. An early to mid 80s Super Record is the same, too. That is the sum total of my experience with Campy BBs so I can't say for sure that there are not some that fit with the cage the other way and as I have recently seen, and others can attest, there are a lot of BBs out there which need the cage facing the other way (with the exposed balls into the cup).

Of course, having the bearings facing the wrong way might not be your problem, but as long as you're going to take it apart again anyway, you might double check just to be on the safe side.

All you need to know about putting the cage on correctly is that the bearings need to be in contact with the cone. In the Campy type that means the flat surface goes away from the cone, in the conventional cone the flat surface goes toward the cone. Always check by mounting it on the cone, even if you then place it in the cup to assemble. I can't believe anyone could not tell the difference if you turn it back and forth while on the cone.

If Sheldon presented "slighty too loose is better than slightly too tight" then this may well be the very first time he's been caught being wrong. Ball bearings all need to operate with a touch of preload. The amount of preload is set by the load they will have to take, With our cup and cone bottom brackets and with wheel hubs where there are a lot of elastic elements between the two bearings the preload needs to be set with the amount of flex in mind.

In each case the goal is to NEVER have the balls lose contact with the cup or cone at any point in their rolling path while under load. If the preload is not high enough and things flex enough to let the balls run loose at some point then the balls will be shot forward in their path. It's just like a slippery pumpkin seed pinched between two fingers when this happens. And then the balls bang into each other or the cage and also hammer at the bearing track. It also puts all the load on the ball or two at the opposite side of the bearing instead of forcing the load to be graduated between the half of the balls on the load side of the bearing. Wear under such conditions is far more rapid than when some preload is maintained at all points in the path. And this isn't just for bicycles. It's a common factor in rolling element bearings in any field from the space shuttle down to our lowly bicycles.

So without making the balls feel like they are cogging and advancing in little steps set the preload so you can feel some resistance in the spindle that is over and above any seal resistance. Get a feel for the seal resistance while the cups are still too loose but close. Then preload the cup you're adjusting until you feel it is rough and cogging. Back it off until there is some resistance from the bearings but it's smooth in feel. That's likely as good as it'll get. Then re-check and adjust as needed to maintain this feel as you tighten the locking ring because it will tend to loosen things up as the cup and ring tighten up just as another poster above described.

Granted with a cup and cone setup and with the tolerances that can sometimes stack up badly it may not be possible to set the preload so the spindle feels the same way all the way around. But contrary to some other posts I would err on the side of being a hair tight at one spot instead of having any play at the loosest spot.

This preload requirement is even MORE important for something like a headset. If there isn't enough preload then the balls at the extremes will cause brinnelling of the tracks and then the steering gets all notchy feeling.

my opinion.

run it just a touch loose for a ride or 2 then readjust and see if you can hit the sweet spot. the grease will find its way to where it should be and perhaps it will allow you adjust it to your liking.

This is not a matter of grease finding it's way - there should be enough grease to completely seal in the balls. Again, if it's a properly broken in bearing set it will be quite smooth. On a new set you have to tolerate some roughness - even Campy will be better after the bearings run a smooth track into the machined surface. If you adjust on the loose side at all you will be less likely to get a proper wear-in. I've owned many bikes, worked on thousands, which means I've done a lot of bearing adjustments and overhauls. Very few could not be adjusted acceptably with no play if the parts were proper. A new bottom bracket willdevelop play while smoothing out and have to be readjusted to maintain and atke advantage of proper break-in.

This has all been very helpful. I’m going to print out this thread for future reference as it is something that I’m sure I will be doing again in the future. As far as the cage being correctly inserted; it is a Shimano off an 89 touring bike with Deore components, so I’m assuming that it is a Deore BB. Standard British 68 1.37 x 24 tpi. It sounds like the balls facing out toward the cups is correct. It doesn’t really roll that badly, just a ‘very slight’ knock when I tug on the crank arm. However, without the benefit of experience, ‘very slight’ to me may be something very different to an experienced mechanic. It sounds like there should be no play at all, in fact, a slight load or drag would be better. As long as it’s smooth. As far as always replacing the bearings, I’m going to call the LBS to see if they have replacement caged bearings, or would it be better to go with free balls? At this point I’m willing to rebuild it as many times as it takes to get it right, otherwise, how am I ever going to get the feel for what a properly adjusted BB should feel like.

There is no need to for ya’ll to have to respond again. I know you probably have better things to do. I’ll figure out the caged vs. free thing. You have all been extremely informative and helpful.

Thank You!
Jeff

All you have to know about caged versus free is that caged are cheaper. Usually, there are two balls deleted, which saves them some money, but the big savings is 2 parts to install versus 22. That saves a couple minutes a bike, which is a real savings. If you're doing it your self, use loose balls.

The way to do it with loose balls is as follows (I should make a video of this, but hopefully I can explain well enough):

1. After cleaning everything thoroughly put a good glob of grease on your fingertip and place it in the fixed cup by inserting your finger and then wiping toward the outside of the cup. Repeat all the way around until you have a generous continuous ring of grease.

2. Take a bearing in your left hand and place it in the cup, guiding it into place with your other finger coming through from the adjustable cup side. Repeat until there are 11 ball bearings. Put a good bead of grease in the adjustable cup and place 11 balls in it. Insert the spindle into the adjustable cup (make sure it's the left hand end of the spindle). Rotate the spindle around and remove. There should be a continuous surface of grease on the inside and outside radius - if not add a bit more grease and check again.

3. Place the spindle back on the adjustable cup and grease the cup threads slightly. If there are openings in the bottom bracket to your frame tubes I would recommend a BB sleeve to protect against dirt. Place the sleeve over the spindle and carefully insert into the bottom bracket, guiding it into place with your left finger from the fixed cup side placed on the end of the spindle. Screw the cup in while maintaining pressure so that the bearings stay in place. When you meet resistance from contacting the other side you are ready to adjust.

Last word on loose balls - Grade 25 is tight tolerance (roundness), grade 100 lower, etc.

Have fun, bye!

I always use lose balls. Adjust so that there is a very small amount of drag/resistance when the locknut is fully tightened.