are an enormous pain in the ass. The reason for this can be found
here, or summed up in two words:
proprietary threading.
In short, since Raleigh apparently gave not a single fuck, they decided that almost everything on their bicycles that involved threads (like on a screw, for all of you who aren't mechanically inclined) would be super duper special and not fit any other manufacturers components. In technical terms, Raleigh used threading that was 26 T.P.I (threads per inch), whilst most other manufacturers adhered to 24 T.P.I. This continued until frighteningly recently, but as the late great Sheldon Brown (to whom I owe my entirety of cycling knowledge) said, "Since Raleigh made virtually every part of these bikes, there was no compelling need to match standards used by other manufacturers. (We shouldn't be too hard on Raleigh about this. Making the change would have been very, very costly, and wouldn't have benefited the shareholders in any way.)"
As you may or may not know, Margaret is a Raleigh. Made in the 1970's. So, she has this 'special' proprietary threading all over. Which is extremely, extremely unfortunate; it basically meant that I was going to have a hell of a time updating her components. At first, since I didn't want to deal with all this horse-puckey, I simply cleaned the original bottom bracket components, regreased them, and put new bearings in. Luckily, the cranks I purchased from
Eighth Inch fit the taper of the original spindle!
Unfortunately, this slipshod solution proved impermanent. I was riding around the block this summer and the non-drive crank arm simply fell off. Upon further investigation, the threads on the ends of the spindle had become stripped because, get this, the crank
didn't really fit after all.
| | |
Are you fucking kidding me? |
|
|
So Margaret was out of commission while I had to find a solution to this problem. I could...
- Find another replacement spindle, which would have been somewhat difficult AND I would run into the same problem again
or...
- Purchase a Phil Wood 26 T.P.I bottom bracket, which I would have to start selling crack or my body to pay for or...
- Look into this special bottom bracket that Velo Orange makes, that's used for bottom brackets with damaged threads.
Basically, it has metal sleeves that press into the threads in the frame, which wedges the bottom bracket in place. AND IT WORKS! AND THE TAPER IS CORRECT!
 |
It took a lot of sweat, a towel, and a enormous pipe wrench, but I finally got it to almost seat correctly. |
So now Margaret has a modern, sealed bearing bottom bracket with an appropriate spindle length for a fixed gear.
Huzzah!
In other news, I'm three weeks ahead of schedule in the weight loss department, which is pretty decent (although I'm sure I'll plateau at some point and it will even out). Basically, I've been drinking a lot more water and not eating so much. Seriously, that's pretty much it. I'm glad I'm getting back into this blog; it's a way to keep myself honest over a long period of time.
Have a wonderful evening,
M.