Farewell Cottered Cranks

Finally gave up on running cottered cranks on my old Claud Olympic Sprint. They looked the part but the endless hammering and spannering to keep them tight took it's toll. Just fitted a Sugino Maxy Chainset from http://www.velosolo.co.uk/shopcrank.html
(brilliant - next day delivery) and it runs so sweet I can't imagine why / how I lasted so long on the old cotters...

Yeah my cottered cranks drive me nuts, every time I tighten them it feels like another nail in their coffin. Might replace soon...

yea i had this daily battle with my old cottered cranks for a couple of months, allways squeaking and wobbling.

slack-crank is not good.

If they're working loose you probably need to file the faces of the pins a bit, so that they fit snugly on the axle. You should be able to work out which bits are touching and which bits aren't, so you file that area.

But I have to agree hammering is a pain in the arse. I think my BB is starting to get loose from it. I think there's a thing called a cotter pin press which does this better than a hammer.

i started attacking my rescued dawes frame yesterday. i've got one crank still hanging on by the cotter. has anyone got access to a vice? and wants to hammer the fucker out?
beer?

Vice is probably a good idea, but you can prop it up under the axle (something narrow to fit between the BB and the crank), so that you;r not effectively hammering away at your BB cluster, and hammer some more. Maybe try some WD40 in there before hand.

I finally vowed to never use a cotter again recently. My stradas are working nicely!

oh no, i've taken the cranks off the frame. ,i managed to get one crank off, took the lockring off the bottom bracket, then took the remaining crank/bottom bracket assembly out. i've got one cup to remove from the frame. and i'm left with a crank arm i want to remove from bottom bracket.
sprayed some wd40 in there yesterday. will give it another go tonight. also have a headset to remove.
and pics to take before i get it off down to armourtex for a new colourscheme.

access to a vice would be grand then i can practice my polishing skillz on these older bitz.yo.

O I C.

Well, if you can be bothered.

Next year I'm going to go all Ti and carbon, the way things are going.

lightweight.

Yes!

no rust either.

I did a search and couldn't find what I'm asking - apologies if it's been done before.

Got an old bike mostly stripped and ready to start trying to de-rust the frame. But here's my snag... The crank arms seem to be seized on. And the thread on the inside are rusted, so I can't get a crank-puller in.

How can I get seized-on crank arms off an old cotterless crank BB? Flat-bladed screwdriver and work around it on all 4 sides? Been trying that with no luck. Anything else?

If need be, I'm happy to cut the fuckers off with a mangle-grinder cos I'm not keeping rusty crank arms or the BB. I can't get to the drive side with the angle grinder though - the chain rings are in the way. I'll take my chances with going a bit psycho on it and ending up chewing into the frame if this is my only choice. ;-)

Suppose I run an angle grinder up on the non-drive side and cut through the BB arm, I can then unscrew the ring holding the old BB in place (I checked, that's not rusty). Will that help me though? Can I remove the BB+drive side crank and rings in one piece from the non-drive side? Need pics of the BB to tell?

http://www.londonfgss.com/thread19138.html
http://www.londonfgss.com/thread29574.html

Nice one Hippy. Thanks. ;-)

OK, well looks like it's angle-grinder time!!!

someone on here came up with a genius solution using a plumbing thing that is like a claw of death and it pops em out.
but anglegrinding is all good- two ways of going about it-

1. the way you mentioned- through BB axle
   
2. cutting a notch carefully in the crank, on the underside, if you get what i mean i.e. the rounded bit not the arm itself, to relieve the tension and then prising off.
   H
   

Thanks for the tips.

looking for a metal cutting disk, cos all I can find are stone ones

There are a crap load of kids outside having a birthday party. If I use a mangle grinder with a stone disk to cut metal, it'll scare the fuck out of them!!! MWA-HAH-HAAAA
.

i don't think it makes a difference.
i've seen no. 2 done by bike stores, if that helps, but if you're chucking them, then who cares.

Contact Retro_Di_Corsa?
http://www.londonfgss.com/thread26571.html

http://www.mptools.co.uk/products.asp?partno=MS23
£10

Too late! Hot knife vs. butter. POWER TOOLS ROOLZ!!!

Thanks guys, that worked a treat. ;-)

Only problem is, now I can't find my BB tool. Arse-monkeys!!

1. cutting a notch carefully in the crank, on the underside, if you get what i mean i.e. the rounded bit not the arm itself, to relieve the tension and then prising off.
   H
   
   

this worked for me

Just for the record:

For anyone else looking to remove cranks that aren't good for anything else, I can thoroughly recommend boiling the kettle, pouring hot water over one of the arms and whacking it hard with a mallet. I used the back side of a hatchet - came off after three blows no probs. Repeat for other side. I'd hold the frame with one hand while doing this, you probably don't want to be resting the frame on something whilst battering the shit out of it.

Also, I'm replacing the BB - if you're not doing this I'd be wary of fucking the axle.

what happened to the crank arms that was so terrible?

They were rank, cheap, massive, old and scratched.

that probs happened before you poured water on them honestly hot water sounds like a very gentle way to remove something especially when compared to a blow tourch