Qui si parla Campagnolo wrote:

Chalo wrote:


Do switch to some kind of tubular spindle crank if your bike is
equipped with a square taper, though. When those things snap off-- and
that is the only way they fail structurally-- you can get seriously
hurt. One of the new 2-piece cranks with outboard-mounted BB bearings
would be a good choice.

Maybe you ought to see how much the gent weighs before you assume that
a square taper crank/BB will be unsafe. Many have ridden square taper
w/o problem for decades, and to paint it as 'unsafe' for nearly anybody
is not accurate.

As I've told you before, I have broken two square tapers under pedaling
loads alone; one when I weighed about 240 lbs., and the other when I
weighed about 260 lbs.

IMO this is not so far out of the normal range that the square taper
can be considered safe. The OP does consider himself enough heavier
than average to pose the question.

In 20 years I have seen 3 BB square tapers break. I have also seen 2
octalink break and we will have to see about the two piece systems, as
they have only been around for 3 years so far.

That's not terribly surprising about Octalink (it being a Shimano
product after all), but I did assume that the feeble little crankarm
splines would strip before the "pipe spindle" snapped.

Chalo Colina