Coolest Bottom Bracket ever
 

Well, this one on ebay has my vote

Boone Helix - twist titanium

http://i.ebayimg.com/t/Boone-Hellix-...D5Q~~60_57.JPG

LINK to auction
No, it's not mine.

That's cool. I'd paint it red and white before I would install it..

OK, I'm not convinced that it's any better than a regular BB, but my jaw hurts from dropping so hard. IT'S SO PRETTY.

One of these in your favorite nice-day-only bike with a huge BB cutout would be the bee's knees.

See, I tell my son all the time; spin, spin, spin....mashing is hard on the drivetrain.

That is a thing of beauty. Trying now to imagine machining those flutes.

Add to your daydream forking out over $400 it!

My wattage would snap it.

That totally justifies bottom bracket shell cutouts, but I'd want them in the top so I could watch it spinning :thumb:

With a few mods one could make sausage while riding. ;)

That spindle is super cool looking.

Increasing the effective outside diameter of the BB spindle should counter the flex of a ti unit to a point.
Way back in an old article of Bicycling Magazine, like early 70's, there was a design of a spindle a guy machined with a big increase in diameter, in that design the spindle was made from two halves and silver soldiered together then finish machined. supposedly no heavier but stiffer. No one had come up with the oversized diameter outboard bearing idea yet.

As a kid I was drawing up a super wide BB shell, 80 mm, but planned on using a special Phil Wood bottom bracket, just moving the bearings outboard and maintaing the standard overall length. Phil said he would make it, the up charge was $100! Quite a bit in 1974, so the idea never went anywhere.

think this is the crankset by the same guy

http://www.boonerings.com/imagesnew/gears.jpg

We helped free a guys arm out of an industrial meat grinder that looked like that! but a whole lot bigger!

Can you say 5 axis machining center? pretty nice.

Just a thought but that twisted shape may be a result of work hardening the axle by deforming it in torsion. In other words, start with a square section and then by twisting it until it yields there will be an increase in strength. Not sure if I'd use this technique but it's an interesting one to consider.

Rather a waste to have that hidden inside the BB shell.

Seconding this. Doubly so at $458

I kinda had a similar thought,....but more like it was an "accident".

It started life as a square spindle, but Lance got a bit more juice than usual and spun one side just a "wee" bit too hard. :D


http://i.ebayimg.com/t/Boone-Hellix-...D5Q~~60_57.JPG

I'm just going to tell people that's what I'm using. That way I can be cool and pay the mortgage.

Bent fork, ahoy! ;)

This could be done with "just" a fourth axis. Or a CNC lathe with live tooling, but that's just a 4-axis in a different configuration. It's hard to tell at the angles pictured, but I'm not sure even that would be needed. I almost think the curve of the flute is an illusion caused by the shape of the center. An indexing head set at an angle to the X-axis may be sufficient if the flutes are actually a strait cut with a ball-nose.

Pretty cool looking piece to be sure. It would almost be a shame to hide in a BB shell with out a big cut out and even then you'd have to flip the bike upside down to admire it! I'd love to see more pics of his crank and chain-rings.

I have never actually lusted after a bottom bracket till now. I would build a bike around that.

This is a spindle that could be used with a doped bike via the seat tube.

Just imagine what Drillium Dude would do with that....

All my bikes have those. The cottered version is especially hard to find.

:innocent:

(actually, I have no idea what you guys are talking about. The auction is over and the pictures are gone).

Too bad, cuz it was just the coolest thing ever! ;)