On Tuesday, October 13, 2015 at 7:09:22 PM UTC-4, wrote:
On Tuesday, October 13, 2015 at 2:16:16 PM UTC-7, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Monday, October 12, 2015 at 5:06:19 AM UTC-4, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
I was finally able to get the bottom bracket off of a friend's steel frame English threads bottom bracket bike. Whew what a job! The fixed cup cup was cross-threaded. He wants to put in a standard square-taper spindle cartridge bottom bracket. The problem is since the fixed cup was cross-threaded I can't get the new cartridge to thread in properly. Does a decent bicycle shop have a way to correct the cross-threaded threads in the bottom bracket shell? If so what's a ballpark price for doing it?

Thanks and cheers

I used an old pair of bottom bracket cups to make a tool to cleanup the threads. I cut some grooves into a fixed cup and made a spacer to fit inside the fixed cup and adjustable cup. I screwed the adjustable cup inmost of the way and then started the fixed cup supported by the internal spacer as I threaded the fixed cup in I backed out the adjustable cup which with the spacer kept the fixed cup square to the bottom bracket shell. Surprisingly, by working very slowly on it, it worked and I was able to cleanup the cross threading and then install a sealed cartridge bottom bracket. Everything tightened up okay. i guess my next step will be to strip the frame and repaint it. i also need to either get a riser quill stem, a quill to threadless stem adapter and stem, or an adjustable stem to get the bars uo to where I most prefer them. A shakedown ride today shows that all's well except I'd prefer a bit longer reach on my stem.

Cheers

Old BB cups are not made with metal hard enough to clean threads properly.. That's why taps are made of extremely hardened steel. To the point where they can be broken if mishandled.

Maybe not but that tol I made worked well. if there were no threads and i was cutting threads then i know i'd need a special tool. Bike shops with the proper tools and people who know how to use them are not that close to where i live. i have to either bicycle to tthe shop or take an inter-city bus.

As far as the cartridge bottom bracket goes, I have a number of NOS ones here suitable for triples and i have some for doubles and singles too. There's a shop 25km (15 miles) from me that has lots of NOS square taper bottom brackets including Italian threaded ones at very low prices i.e. $5.00 to $10.00 on average. that's only a 50 km round trip ride but I need to find out what days he's open.

One thing I really like about tthe old school cranks like the Deore and sugino that I've collected as replacementsa is that I can get a very low Q-factor with them.

Cheers