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As title really, my very old XT crankarms have finally given up. These were pre pinch spacer and the outer pinch bolt thread has stripped in the arm. The inner is OK and it holds it on in the short term alright, however I think it'll need something doing long term.
Any options for repairing it? metal putty, drill, thread and reuse? helicoil? drill and tap an M6 bolt in there?
with new XT arms costing about £100 and second hand looking very rare I think a repair is more likely an option..
thanks
Depending on how bad it is, you may get away with a longer bolt, i'd recommend a Helicoil otherwise.M6 probably not viable as the head will be too large for the recess.
The bolt is a slightly longer one in any case so no chance of a grip on the last bit of thread unfortunatley.
I run some with just one bolt, after the outer bolt stripped. Holds fine. Not died.
How bothered are you about aesthetics?
Use a longer bolt with a nut on the end
cool, may well do, may try a helicoil, or countersink the other side and use a v brake block nut, that should be neat.
I think the shimano bolts already have low diameter heads than normal but if you do want to re-drill and tap with a larger thread then just put a spacer in the existing counter bore and leave the bolt head proud. Won't get in the way.
Countersink and V brake nut sound good.
I've done a repair on an old XT crank arm with the same problem.
I drilled the striped thread out, inserted a bolt from the wrong direction, then filed down a nut and pushed it into the recess where the bolt head should sit.
Tightened the bolt up and it pulled the nut into the crank arm where it's quite happily sat for the last couple of years.
I was going to helicoil it but it went just before a ride and i didn't have a helicoil handy.