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Went to look at a second hand cannondale synapse last night with a BB30 bottom bracket & carbon cranks. Bottom bracket hand a little bit of grease coming out of it bit nothing major, the main thing that worried me though was the play in the left hand side cranks arm ( both up and down & side to side). Is this a minor problem that could be fixed with a tighten up or a goosed crank arm that would need replacement?
Cheers
Dan
It could just be a shot bearing. If the play was allowing the axle to slide in and out then its a wavy washer/preload issue. Up and down/side to side will be a totally goosed bearing in there, so that will require a change (assuming that the axle moves with the crank and it's not the axle and crank interface that's at fault)
Not got any bikes with bb30 but can you not get the seller to losen crank, increase pre load on the bb then retighen? If not, Shirley worst case it will only be cost of a new bb and fitting and you can get a quote prior to negotiating?
Thanks for the replies, the movement in the crank arm is between the crank arm and the BB. The BB itself seemed solid with no creaking when pedalling and no movement from the drive side crank arm. I suspect the LHS crank's not been tightened enough or has come loose at some point but wondered if riding around on this ( as I suspect the current owner has) would've damaged the crank arm ?
Cheers
Dan
Hmm, it's easy enough to just loosen it with an 8mm allen key - worth doing just to clear it up. The axle won't take kindly to being ridden around on loose - you could use it as a haggling point. A rubber mallet will also tap the chainset out easily enough so you can check the bearings.
Can't you just whip the LHS crank off and inspect it/the bearing? That would tell you what's what.
i had no end of problems with the BB30 on my cannondale, i absolutly hated it.
it might be the sleeve that holds the BB, rather than the cranks - the BB cups tighthen into the sleave, which is in turn held in place in the frame by loctite.
on mine the water got into the space between the sleeve and the frame and as the water pulls in the grit, combined with a spray of lube, the loctite perishes and then the whole crankset will wobble and will feel like the crank is loose - on mine the entire assembly came out of the frame half way down whites level
the good news is you don't have to replace the BB and it doesn't damage the crank or frame, but it is a pain to fix as you need a special tool to get the sleeve out, but your LBS should be able to do it no problem - see if the seller will knock £50 to get it fixed - or better still get him to fix it before you buy
having said all that - without seeing the bike i dont know if that is the case, but it was with mine, so you might want to see if the LBs will have a look at the bike first
I bought a synapse in 2007 new, it's been a stunning bike and i still love riding it, but the bb30 was rubbish. I had my LBS glue in an adaptor, and put in Dura- ace shell bearings & an ultegra chainset.
The engineering on bb30 is crap, imo, honestly - a wavy washer to hold it all in? The washer wore a ragged groove in the back of the carbon crank arm. Piss poor.
it might be the sleeve that holds the BB, rather than the cranks
Are you not describing a the press-fit adaptor, which allows you to use threaded BB's in a BB30 shell?