The TA cranks I just got are Laser-etched also. They are marked BSC, but as I said, non-TA English pedals go in very tight. It appears what has happened is that TA has made the thread on the most recent "BSC" Cyclotourist production a little undersized to fit well with the slightly oversized French pedals which they mark "BSC". This makes anyone else's English pedals tight in the latest Cyclotourist cranks, and TA pedals tight in French cranks. This has allowed TA to dispense with separate French and English road pedals. Perhaps now they have stopped making French threaded Cyclotourists as well. All of this seems a bit insane until you consider that pedals for toe clips and Cyclotourist cranks are a tiny niche market. Perhaps most of their market for these items are older riders in France, where this strategy might make sense. One hopes they are not foolish enough to reduce the thread dimensions of their more mainstream Alize and Zephyr ranks for the sake of road pedals that mainstream cyclists have no interest in.
Regards,
Jerry Moos
Houston, TX
> I have put a set of brand-new TA "Pro 5 vis" (the model called
> Cyclotouriste over her) on my tandem. Three cranks accepted Look Moab
> spd-style pedals (BSC threads) just fine, like any modern BSC cranks.
> One, ordered later (when we switched from rear drive to the rear
> wheel to front drive, and needed a shorter crank) must have been
> delivered accidentally with FR thread. The pedal was hard to thread
> in, but in it went with some force on the wrench. I did not observe
> any metal shavings.
>
> A few notes:
> - It is possible that the first three cranks were NOS, i.e., they had
> been lying around for a while. But the fact that we had to wait
> months until TA delivered indicates that we were waiting for a
> production run of the odd sizes we wanted (167.5 in the rear). All
> cranks mentioned have the laser-etched (?) logo rather than the
> sticker.
> - The Look pedals thread nicely into all other BSC cranks I have,
> without being loose.
>
> Jan Heine, Seattle