Tightening Bottom Bracket

Avery

Hi

I wonder if anyone could help me out.

I was wondering what would be involved in the tightening of the bottom bracket on my bike. I have attached an image of it.

I am getting a little bit of side to side movement in the BB.

Does the Crank set have to come off completely to tighten it?

Is there a special tool required?

Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks

Zen0

If it's just the bottom bracket that's coming loose, you can use a c-spanner to tighten that. They used to come free with older bikes, but if you don't have one you might be quicker getting LBS to do it. Alternatively, you could tap it gently tighter with a hammer and some slender tool like a chisel, but I couldn't possibly recommend such a blatant misuse of tools. No need to remove crank.

Is that an orange chain, or is it really rusted. If the latter, your bb might not be great inside.

cdaly_

As Zeo0 said, you can tighten it without removing the crank:

1. Loosen the locking ring (C-spanner or hammer and screwdriver)
2. Tighten the cup with an open ended spanner (not too tight, just enough to stop the end-float).
3. Hold the cup steady while you tighten the locking ring (C-spanner is much handier here, otherwise use an assistant)

That said, it's worthwhile removing the cranks (another special tool), opening up the BB, cleaning and greasing the hell out of everything and re-assembling.

thebikeman.ie

That’s an old style cup and cone BB. If it has developed some movement it’s likely there is some wear on it, in which case it may need a proper service and will need to be stripped, or possibly replaced. If you haven’t done this before and don’t have the tools it’s a job for your LBS.

When I trained as a bike mechanic we were advised not to service these old style BB but to replace them with a modern sealed cartridge bottom brackets. I replaced the cup and cone BB on my hybrid bike with a 20 euro cartridge BB from Halfords and have done over 20,000 km so far on the new BB. This is a straight forward and quick job for a LBS and should not cost too much in labour.

On the other hand you could try cdalys advise and see if that sorts the problem.

My advise take it to the LBS and get them to replace it with a cartridge bottom bracket.

feck sake lads

if it needs tightening more than likely its knackered as the bikeman advised get a new one.

hesker

Just because it's a bit loose does not mean it is necessarily knackered. These old bbs are easy to maintain with the right tools which are fairly cheap.

http://sheldonbrown.com/tooltips/bbadj.html

Tighten it up a bit. Better to learn how to take it apart for inspection, then clean and lubricate.

Avery

Thanks for all the advice.

It is a red chain, not rusty!

It was actually 'replaced' not too long ago by rothar. I got them to swap out the old cottered cranks for a square taper. Hopefully it has a bit more life in it but it is a second-hand BB.

I'll try to tighten it up and hopefully should get a bit more life from it.
There isn't any major movement.