Poll - Does your Bottom Bracket Creak? PressFit Vs Threaded

Back by popular demand, the general all-things Road forum!

Moderator: robbosmans

Does your BB Creak? (Add your Comments on Length of ownership in years or miles)

PF30 Creaks
15
8%
BB86 Creaks
13
7%
BB30 Creaks
22
11%
BB90/92/96 Creaks
3
2%
Pressfit (not listed above) Creaks
2
1%
PF30 Silent
41
21%
BB86 Silent
35
18%
BB30 Silent
32
16%
BB90/92/96 Silent
14
7%
Pressfit (not listed above) Silent
17
9%
 
Total votes: 194

highdraw

by highdraw

MisterMuncher wrote:2 minutes every year hardly counts as a waste of time.

can you explain in some detail what you accomplish in these two minutes and why you choose an interval of one a year?

by Weenie


Visit starbike.com Online Retailer for HighEnd cycling components
Great Prices ✓    Broad Selection ✓    Worldwide Delivery ✓

www.starbike.com



User avatar
Samuel Sanchez Gonzalez
Posts: 2147
Joined: Sun Sep 19, 2004 6:21 pm
Location: around Paris

by Samuel Sanchez Gonzalez

Cannondale System Six BB30 + Hollowgram => creaks

English 68mm threaded => perfectly silent

zuntopia
Posts: 10
Joined: Fri Oct 02, 2015 3:05 pm

by zuntopia

I have S-works new Tarmac, anc ultegra crank. It creaks.

cedced74
Posts: 93
Joined: Wed Dec 04, 2013 8:26 pm

by cedced74

My Colnago C60, Ceramicspeed BB86 with Dura Ace 9000 crank and Loctite, absolutely silent, and smooth.
My two mountain goats, with THM bearings and Clavicula cranks, silent too...
But I have owned a SSix Evo HiMod, with PF30 and SiSl2 : sometimes creaking :(

MisterMuncher
Posts: 268
Joined: Thu Apr 11, 2013 2:15 am

by MisterMuncher

highdraw wrote:
MisterMuncher wrote:2 minutes every year hardly counts as a waste of time.

can you explain in some detail what you accomplish in these two minutes and why you choose an interval of one a year?


It's an average. I'm getting about two bike-years per set of bearings. Takes about two minutes to run a couple of dozen bearings through the calipers and select for best fit, and put the rejects in an envelope for return.

It doesn't really warrant much detail. Or condescension.

highdraw

by highdraw

MisterMuncher wrote:
highdraw wrote:
MisterMuncher wrote:2 minutes every year hardly counts as a waste of time.

can you explain in some detail what you accomplish in these two minutes and why you choose an interval of one a year?


It's an average. I'm getting about two bike-years per set of bearings. Takes about two minutes to run a couple of dozen bearings through the calipers and select for best fit, and put the rejects in an envelope for return.

It doesn't really warrant much detail. Or condescension.

Sorry it does...in bold.
There is no need for a select fit. Also, you would have to perform a design of experiment to develop an interference threshold of acceptability. Further you could pull from the a barrel of bearings and not find a target diameter. Your whole exercise is tantamount to witch craft. You might as well sprinkle fairy dust on your BB and call it good.

MisterMuncher
Posts: 268
Joined: Thu Apr 11, 2013 2:15 am

by MisterMuncher

And yet, it works. Which rather cuts your high horse off at the ankles.

Given your insistence that certain things simply must be used, I'd be a little more guarded with analogies to sprinkling fairy dust.

highdraw

by highdraw

MisterMuncher wrote:And yet, it works. Which rather cuts your high horse off at the ankles.

Given your insistence that certain things simply must be used, I'd be a little more guarded with analogies to sprinkling fairy dust.

Most people don't waste money with a barrel of BB30 bearings, a subset of which they discard because of an unscientific assessment of optimal interference fit. Select fit is completely unnecessary.

As part of cleaning your kitchen table each night after dinner you can climb a tree too if you wish but is completely unnecessary to cleaning your table. You are sprinkling fairy dust, you just don't know better.
Your approach in no different than placebo. You could also take a suger pill as well to guard against the evil spirits of a creaking BB30. Just whatever you do, don't use grease to wax your car...lol.

MisterMuncher
Posts: 268
Joined: Thu Apr 11, 2013 2:15 am

by MisterMuncher

And on what basis is it unscientific? Because it isn't endorsed by Spesh's sooper-dooper R&D Division? Would putting a bit of loctite I plainly don't need be any less a placebo? Given I'm selecting for four slightly variable diameters, probability doesn't require a barrel of bearings. Or any more than a couple of dozen. The waste of money is a non-starter, because those I don't use I return, at no cost.

Still, though. Indulge me, genius. If I'm doing it wrong and it doesn't work, how come it works?

highdraw

by highdraw

MisterMuncher wrote:And on what basis is it unscientific? Because it isn't endorsed by Spesh's sooper-dooper R&D Division? Would putting a bit of loctite I plainly don't need be any less a placebo? Given I'm selecting for four slightly variable diameters, probability doesn't require a barrel of bearings. Or any more than a couple of dozen. The waste of money is a non-starter, because those I don't use I return, at no cost.

Still, though. Indulge me, genius. If I'm doing it wrong and it doesn't work, how come it works?

You are adding needless cost to bearing suppliers in the industry...lol...by returning perfectly good bearings. This falls under the category of 'irresponsible'...you passing your so called 'no cost' back to the supplier which simply increases the cost of bearings to more responsible people and shops that don't participate in your silly practice. Do you go purchase a vacuum cleaner every time you vacuum your floor and then return it too?..lol. Kind of the like the guy who buys 5 iphones and returns 4 because of a perceived fidelity difference that doesn't exist.
If a bike owner replaces an entire groupset because his chain is worn, his solution works too doesn't it?
You really shouldn't be perpetrating your practice on the web and why I called you out initially. You are simply contributing to the pervasive noise forgive the pun and confusion associated with simple PF BB's. Using grease + choosing a precise select fit is not even a good practice let alone best practice. You can put strawberry jam on your chain as chain lube as well and your bike will ride quite nicely. Heck, you can even stop and put some jam on bread for a snack. Possibilities abound!

MisterMuncher
Posts: 268
Joined: Thu Apr 11, 2013 2:15 am

by MisterMuncher

You want a step ladder for that reaching? Odd that the originators of BB30 endorse grease over Loctite, and it is recommended as mild interference fit. Still, I suppose Cannondale/Magic Motorcycle know nothing either. Best you call them out too. The returned bearings are restocked by the seller. It's no different to ordering clothing in several sizes and sending back the ones that don't fit. Has that pushed the price of clothing up? Why do retailers offer free returns? Do you honestly think the press-fit bottom bracket market represents a significant percentage of the global bearing market?

highdraw

by highdraw

MM, best to not engage you further as more debate will only devolve and no need for that in interest of forum decorum.
We have stated our positions, established there is no common ground and best to leave it.

User avatar
GorrGrimWolf
Posts: 136
Joined: Sat Jan 04, 2014 6:26 pm

by GorrGrimWolf

I have the shit called OSBB (carbon) and to make it worse I have decided to run Campy cranks...

LBS has installed cranks and each turn results in a creak. Nothing has helped... Of course, they have decided to actually press campy BB30 adapter to Specialized nylon adapters. Which isnt the best way to do it in the first place.

I have bough a Praxis BB and it is just dead silent. Also it is a amazing piece of engineering. I am really impressed by the idea and personally I think this is the best of both worlds.

highdraw

by highdraw

GorrGrimWolf wrote:I have the shit called OSBB (carbon) and to make it worse I have decided to run Campy cranks...

LBS has installed cranks and each turn results in a creak. Nothing has helped... Of course, they have decided to actually press campy BB30 adapter to Specialized nylon adapters. Which isnt the best way to do it in the first place.

I have bough a Praxis BB and it is just dead silent. Also it is a amazing piece of engineering. I am really impressed by the idea and personally I think this is the best of both worlds.

What you call crap carbon OSBB aka 61mm is nothing more than PF30 with a 7mm narrower BB shell which Specialized discontinued in 2015 because you are right, it just isn't as reliable as industry std. BB30 Spesh now uses on all their race bikes...but old school carbon OSBB can be made close by not sourcing their delrin bushings and press in cartridge BB30 bearings and going with an integrated cup and bearing PF30 construction where the bearings can't move within the cups. Several companies make this type of PF30 design and if loctited to carbon shell, dead quiet. Doesn't work with a Campy 25mm spindle diameter though.
Carbon OSBB + Campy UT crank is arguably one of the most difficult combinations to tame without question and Campy press in cups with Delrin carbon OSBB bushings are probably the WORST combination in the industry...to the point that Specialized developed another ill fated but better adapter/spacer combo specifically for Campy's UT 25mm spindle diameter...kind of a desperate move really which never really caught on with the public...but better than BB/PF30 Press in cups for sure...which tended to peel away from the frame with time...Loctite or not...much better with Loctite tho.

Praxis to the rescue as you mention. Praxis in their wisdom developed their non invasive and rock solid expanding collet BB design and developed one expressly for a Campy UltraTorque crank + BB/PF30. Bravo Praxis for your foresight, engineering and execution. Design of the year for Campy lovers who own either BB30 or PF30. Previously a Campy crank is virtually unmanageable on a PF/BB30 bike unless you want to press in a BSA alloy sleeve made by several companies like German C-bear, Sram and others...which many have now done who became exasperated with BB/PF 30...especially if they wanted to run a Campy crank reliably. Some would say 'devolving' BB/PF 30 to BSA where Campy and Shimano cranks are plug and play unadapted is actually a big step forward...but removing such a rigid sleeve from a hard carbon PF30 BB shell has consequences to the frame..or can...considered a semi-permanent solution which could devalue the frame in the eyes of some for resale. I would probably steer clear in fact because to me, this solution is a bit too invasive but effective. Praxis is completely reversible. Superb product as you say and perhaps in totality, the best BB design ever conceived and maybe the direction of the industry moving forward...but can't be applied to common BB86 wide BB shell designs...or Trek's BB90 or Cervelo's BBright...but will see how the industry continued to evolve.

If this thread and thousands like it on the web prove anything, there is a big disconnect between the public and current PF designs...the public yearns for a more mistake proof design. Praxis is about the closest thing there is for BB/PF30 but that leaves out a ton of wider shell PF BB bikes as discussed.

by Weenie


Visit starbike.com Online Retailer for HighEnd cycling components
Great Prices ✓    Broad Selection ✓    Worldwide Delivery ✓

www.starbike.com



cobrakai
Posts: 76
Joined: Wed Jun 24, 2015 11:19 pm

by cobrakai

Even manufacturers can't agree on what best practice is for installing pressed in bearings. For example, FSA instructions only mention using grease: http://www.fullspeedahead.com/wp-conten ... y-2010.pdf

Cannondale recommends Loctite only if the tolerances between frame and bearing are resulting in a 'partial press or slip' fit, which they say means the bearing can be pushed in without the use of a press.
http://media.cannondale.com/media/manua ... ns_web.pdf

Specialized instructs either grease or Loctite, depending on which installation guide you look at
Grease: http://www.specialized.com/OA_MEDIA/pdf ... ank_r3.pdf
Loctite: http://service.specialized.com/collater ... 253_R1.pdf

As someone who just purchased a BB30 frame but haven't decided on a crankset yet, all the conflicting information is definitely leading me towards a praxis adapter and 24mm spindle crankset.

Post Reply