merziac

That is awesome! Never thought I would see someone tripilize a steel cottered crank.

Sign me up if you make any more plz.

jackbombay

Thanks!

What do you get when you mix a pretty well set up shop with a guy that doesn't watch TV? Well, I myself am never quite sure what will emerge from my shop, but hopefully a functioning tripilizer will show up on the "done" list before too long!

Certainly! Good to know you have some cottered crank bikes in your collection!

Once I have one made and all the details figured out it would be fairly easy to make more using the original as a template.

Is the 3 hole crank BCD on my Super Course fairly standard? I read somewhere here that it is 116mm BCD, but I didn't actually measure, I just kept everything centered and used the rings as guides/templates. With this first one I'm just seeing if it will work, it could use some tweaks to make it a little more presentable, but mixing a 5 hole pattern and a 3 hole pattern results in some sort asymmetry no matter how you line it all up.

merziac

I'm not sure, of course some were different but I think many were the same. Being Nervar, I would think some French are the same, maybe Stronglight and others.

Hopefully the experts will chime in. I have a BCD checker that makes it very easy and lazy so I will check some that I have.

merziac

Doh!

Checker is for 4 and 5 arm so don't know mm but Campy GS 3 arm, Magistroni, Stronglight and TA rings are all the same, pretty sure The Nervar's are too since many of them used the TA and Stronglight rings.

jackbombay

I'll start a new thread about this tripilizer and I'm sure somebody will have the answer, getting a few more people looking at it will probably give me some info on a couple other questions I have about it.

jackbombay

Cottered crank tripilizer thread her ---> Cottered Crank Tripilizer, DIY

jackbombay

I've been geeking out on this bike this evening, my DIY tripilizer is installed and it seems like it should work decently.

And I got the whole frame and fork cleaned up pretty well and put 2 coats of car wax on it.

Front brake got disassembled and polished and installed, yea, non period correct brake shoes, but they do have some nice semi spherical washers to get the brake pad to hit the rim just right along with correct toe in. The Weinmann brakes are a bit funny, when I reassembled them I found I could not tighten down the 11mm bolt all that much without binding the brake, I checked the other one I had not disassembled yet, and those 11mm bolts were just barely snug, they've been like that for 48 years I suppose, but I did put a drop of blue loctite on the threads of the 11mm bolts for the front brake and will do the same for the rear when I get to it.

Pic, because I imagine some of you like shiny objects as much as I do!

Oh, pic doesn't have the brake shoes installed yet.

PilotFishBob 

Your triple-izer looks great - appears you had it chromed? Looks like a little Wankel rotor siting in there.

noglider 

That's normal for Weinmann brakes. The pivot bolt feels too loose when you try to tighten it, and you can't tighten it too much.

jackbombay

I got some aluminum sheet to make it out of and I polished it! Cosmetically I'm quite happy with how it turned out!

Thanks for the info on the Weinmann brakes, good place for a drop of loctite!

noglider 

No Loctite needed. They never come undone and rarely even come loose. Then again, Loctite won't hurt, either.

jackbombay

I'm getting pretty close to done with this bike!

The Carlton brake levers are designed for people with XXXXL size hands, I have XL/XXL sized hands and the reach on these brake levers is big enough that I can't get a finger onto the lever without moving my entire hand partially off the drops, these must be terrible levers for people with normal sized hands, even I don't like them with my giant hands. The lever does have a nice little mechanism that gives the brakes a notable bit of extra slack for removing wheels, this also auto resets when you next pull the break, quite nice. This is also the easiest bit to add onto to shorten the reach. I added 1/4" of aluminum to it, cutting and shaping the little bits is sort of annoying but not the end of the world, I used a coarse disc on my grinder to roughen both surfaces and used JB Weld to fasten my reach adjuster onto the lever.

Unmodified lever,


And a couple shots with the reach adjuster on it,




This mod does still retain the "release" feature so you can pull wheels easily, although I like to run my brakes quite lose so the lever is pretty close to the bar when the pads contact the rim so often times my pads are far enough from the rim that there are no tire clearance issues when pulling wheels anyway.

jackbombay

Bike is done, for now, I picked the wrong green bar tape, and the JB Weld still needs to dry on the brake lever mod, but I'm quite happy with how this turned out, I polished a bunch of the bits and pieces while the bike was apart, and uhhh, yea, I WANT SOME ASPHALT!!!!!! Or I'd be plenty happy to go smash on gravel too. But it would be nice to only ride on asphalt for a bit to keep the bike clean... Ah, and I need to take the logo off the side of the seat post...

Slightspeed

Great job on the SC. The triplizer is a cool piece of engineering, very innovative. Can't wait to see it in person. Must be hard to ride with that white stuff all over the place.😉 I got mine out today for a club ride. I've had mine going on three years now, and it never ceases to amaze me, what a great and versatile ride it is. I also use the Koolstops, but these are dual compound, and in modern Shimano type pad holders. The first Eroica I did was in drizzly muddy weather. As stated before, you will need a big rear freewheel for the dreaded Eroica hills. I'm running a Shimano Megarange 6 speed 34t, which plays nice with the Suntour VGT Luxe RD. Did you need a longer BB axle to accommodate the triple, and what FD did you use? Simplex? I have a Suntour Cyclone II. I've had no problem with the Weinmann levers, but the white Carlton hoods are really hard and a little too narrow for hood riding, which is where I am 95%. Awesone polish job on the GB stem !

See you at Eroica!

jackbombay

Thanks!

I do have a bike with 4.8" tires that does pretty well on snow! I've been sick way longer than I care to admit, I was getting out on my. fat bike halfway regularly, but this lingering cold (flu?) is quite the motivation killer.


These are shimano brake pads, but I've always been a fan of all koolstop products. I did scuff up the rear rim with my grinder to get better braking, I got the wheel whipping arond in my truing stand then grazed each side of the rim with a 60 grit disc in on my grinder, then I hit the rim with a mostly worn out 100 grit flap wheel to remove sharpness created by the 60 grit disc without removing the texture it created, I think it will work great, but will likely wear brake pads a bit quicker.

I'm hoping that 28/28 combined with my love of climbing/getting hurt on the bike, will be enough for the hills, I'll quite likely do some walking though.

I did buy a longer BB spindle, had to get it from UK ebay, $20, doesn't seem to be the best quality, AND I did have to grind the notch for the cotter pin about 1.5mm wider and mount the crank all the way outboard to get it all to work, but it does all work. I have Suntour VX front and rear, I can't use the smallest 2 cogs when I'm in the granny ring or the chain will drag on the bottom of the front derailleur cage, and the chain gets pretty slack too in those cogs, but if I'm in the granny ring I shouldn't use those cogs anyway. Going to a 6 speed would be sweet to get the super low gear, but that would need a VGT Luxe to work. I'm pretty happy with the bike as it sits for now, I may tinker with it more, but outside of Eroica I would have no need for gears lower that 1:1.

YES!!!! Fingers crossed for good weather! Or crap weather, bad weather always makes long rides memorable!