Hapsmo911

So last night I stripped one of my stem bolt heads. They are 3mm and the allen always felt sloppy when turning. I drilled the bolt out today no problem. I then called Ritchey, I was told they had a few complaints about stripped bolts. They are sending me new bolts with torx heads, sounded like they were going to be standard on that stem now. So no complaints about Ritchey customer service they are great. Has anyone else had this problem with their bolts?

jmX

I have a couple of C260 stems and haven't had any problems, but I have a good feel for how tight bolts should be. There's no way I'd torque those things to 5nm or whatever it says on the stem - thats just asking for trouble. The bolts are tiny.

Campag4life

I am a big fan of Ritchey stems and run them on my bikes in various forms. Haven't owned the uberlight C260 yet tho.
Can you be more clear what stripped? Did the thread strip?...or did the hex allen to allen wrench interface round off?
Changing to torx will not change the status of the thread of course. I am presuming by your post you mean the hex itself stripped and not the thread.
Did you use a torque wrench? Also the quality of the allen wrench matters. A soft allen can cause stripping if the hex fit is sloppy to begin with.
I have never had a problem with any Ritchey stem...stainless or Ti bolts.
Interesting that Ritchey will be going Torx. Wonder if they will carry this to other stems or just the different stem plate config. on the C260.
PS: Probably only reason I haven't ordered a C260 stem is...I don't like the 'aesthetc' of 3 bolts on the steerer clamp.

Hapsmo911

The hex allen to allen interface rounded off, I use a torque wrench, with brand new allens, that only get used for the bike. So its not a over tighten, crappy tool problem. The inside of the allen head always felt loose with the allen wrench. Ritchey was pretty clear that they had several complaints about the allens. Enough so that they are not sending me allens, but updated torx head bolts.

garciawork

The one I have in use is doing fine, but I just set it and forget it. Wish I could get one on my Mikkelsen without unwrapping the bars part way... only bummer about the design. LOVE the weight though!

Campag4life

Issue maybe specific to the bolts used on the C260. Because of the flush face plate the screw heads themselves maybe 'shallower' and hence with higher chance of rounding if not manufactured to a tight enough tolerance. I haven't used a C260 so don't know if Ritchey uses specific bolts for that application. If they do and the bolt heads are indeed shallower in keeping with the low face profile, then it would would make sense to go to Torx for greater surface area/engagement.

ColinL

Critically important question:

is there a Ritchey seatpost that truly matches the C260 stem?

Campag4life

I wouldn't attempt to try personally Colin. Ritchey are among my least favorite seatposts even though they are my favorite stems.
Kind of like Campy who I believe make the worst seatposts ever contrived and yet such a fine engineering company.
To me personally, FSA K-force lite is best seatpost on the market for weight, cost, flex, aesthetic, different setbacks and beautifully engineered 2 bolt clamp. I just ordered one in fact to replace my Roubaix carbon post which is decent but not as good.
I find really good companies rarely do it perfectly for all products across the board. My experience.
Btw Specialized makes a very good 2 bolt carbon post versus the single bolt design. I find it interesting that they sell both on their high end frames and yet they are quite different in design. Their 2 bolt post is excellent and a very close cousin to the FSA post I reference.
PS: below is the great Alberto Contador's previous race bike with FSA seatpost...looks to be 25mm offset.

zigmeister

TS, this is a known issue. Ritchey has changed to a star bolt now that is harder and won't have this issue, at even low torque, 3nm levels, as you stated.

Anybody can call Ritchey, or o to the roadbikereview forum, the Ritchey section, Ritchey_Dave is over there, send him a PM with the issue about your stem/model.

They sent me 14 new star bolts for my WCS C260 aluminum stems, as well as other people, at no charge. Got them in a week.

Good customer service...happy customer.

jmX

The issue with the torx bolts is that it seems doubtful most peoples multi-tools will have that tiny torx bit on them. I hate having fasteners I can't deal with on a ride if I need to.

Mike F

Some people on this thread are in the same boat.

https://forums.roadbikereview.com/rit...ew-265010.html