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I dunno how real men rode in the 70's, with or without crank dust caps. One very real function of crank dustcaps was (is) to protect the threads in the crank that engaged the crank puller when you want to remove the cranks from the spindle to clean, lube and adjust the bottom bracket or perform other maintenance that can't be done with the cranks mounted. In the old days before combination crank-bolt/crank extractors, this was important. I lost the wonderful Stronglight model 93 cranks on my Peugeot PX-10 because I chose not to re-install the dust caps. The threads somehow got buggered and no amount of ingenuity from either my brother or me (quite an ingenious pair) could remove the right side crank from the spindle. The bike is now a hot rod, with a whole bunch of different components, not the least of which is (OT) Campy Victory cranks. That wonderful 531 frame still provides avery sweet ride, though in spite of the many OT components. I still yearn occasionally for a set of 93s.
David Faulkner in Sacramento, CA, where the weather is nasty for bicyclists, with rain and wind lasting as far into the future as NOAA can see . . .