Well, they say that no good deed goes unpunished ... and so it went tonight for me, "helping" out a friend with a potentially stripped crank taper.
Since I do not have a correct Stronglight crank bolt tool, I improvised with a thin walled 16mm socket, attached to a strange spigot knob looking socket driver, torqued with a big honkin' Rigid pipe wrench. Removed the bolt and then the non-drive crank, to confirm that the taper was indeed wasted. Repeated the act and removed a similar but newer left crank from a Torpado I am not using (my first purchase form Matteo), in order to temporarily get my buddy's cool Avanti (Swiss) track bike ... back on the road. Reversed the spigot drive tool and began the reinstallation. I should have been watching what I was doing more closely, instead of oooing and ahhing about how much torque I was getting by using the long and heavy pipe wrench. One too many ooo's, and CRACK! ... my guttural sounds turned into ohhhs and owwws. Yep, I broke the head clean off the approximate 1960 bolt, leaving the threaded part stuck in the spindle. Surely, someone more gifted than I will be able to extract the now un-torqued remains from the spindle, but I would like to find a comparable replacement bolt for my friend. I'm not that up on Stronglight products and dates, but I can say that the bolts from my approximate late 1960s Torpado have a concave outer face, and have a bit thicker head depth than those convex ones from the subject early 60s track bike.
All that being said, can someone please sell me a single Stronglight crank bolt with the thin, convex head? Used or new, does not matter. A pair will be OK too, if applicable. Thanks so much...
Ciao,
Mark Agree
(A fool, but NOT fooling around in...)
Southfield MI