You know- this one sure comes down to a dead heat. I think people who collectively have set up, repaired or post mortemed thousands of bikes are of very mixed opinions as to the value of lubing or not lubing crank axle tapers.
Joe B-Z
Great Notch NJ
"Glad I straddled the fence"
> At 7:51 PM -0400 8/3/02, CYCLESTORE@aol.com wrote:
> >Again, if you grease other alloy / steel junctions why not the crank.
>
> Because it's the only real taper fit on your bicycle. I personally
> don't care one way or another if someone lubes the flats of the
> spindle or the top of their seat it's their decision. This is one of
> those things that will be debated endlessly and since I'm only 33 I
> have to listen to this debate for at least another 50 years. I don't
> lube the area, but I don't clean it with acetone either I'm with
> e-richie on this one. I have been told by a few mechanical and
> material engineers that you DO NOT want to lube a tapers of
> DISSIMILAR metal unless corrosion is an issue, alloy crank and
> titanium spindle come to mind. If the materials are similar you
> should lube. I'm sure I can find engineers that totally disagree
> with this too. . . .fine. . . go crazy and argue away. I'll just
> open another beer.
>
> In all the years I've been wrenching on the thousands of bikes I've
> worked on the only down side of doing one over the other that I have
> personally witnessed is to greasing the spindle. The only downside
> to greasing the spindle is that if for some reason your crank starts
> to come loose it will creak. This creaking will tell you your crank
> is coming loose before you feel it and the crank is dead. As Gilbert
> said
>
> >"Greasing the cranks usually removes the annoying clicking/ ticking
> >noise that presents itself when the crank is not greased."
>
> This sound means one thing, and one thing only, and that's that the
> crank is coming loose. Again, lets rehash this: Lube or don't lube.
> . . it really doesn't matter since you can find a couple thousand
> people that agree with you on either side. Plus all those people
> have reasons just as valid as your own. Using one of the most cheesy
> and important quotes, "Can't we all just get along." Can't we just
> move on to something less controversial like helmet laws or clubbing
> baby seals.
> enjoy,
> Brandon"monkeyman"Ives
> Heading back to BBQ and beer in
> Santa Barbara, Calif.