I measured mine, stamped "11 80" (Nov '80 I presume?) & "Stronglight 118 Marque Deposee" & "P" that came out of an Italian threaded 70mm (nominal) bottom bracket shell and the results are: (measured with calipers) end to end: 118.4+mm flange to flange o-o: 56.5mm the DS offset is +2mm (30mm & 32mm) The Italian cups have a "stepped landing" between the bearing race and the spindle hole. If these are not present on the 68mm cups, then maybe this helps account for the shell width difference, but the steps are not as large as 1mm per side. The cup thickness at the spindle is not easy to measure accurately with my tools, but appears to be about 2mm thick. I don't have a French/English cup to compare it to.
So it appears that either Stronglight used the same spindle for both shell widths, or that mine is a mixed unit. I'm going with the former based on other's experiences on here.
Jim Carter "the French metric manufacturing standards were right" living way above my means in Mountain Brook, suburb of Birmingham, Alabama United States of America
________________________________ From: "billydavid13@comcast.net" <billydavid13@comcast.net> To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org Sent: Tue, February 16, 2010 5:53:20 PM Subject: [CR] Stonglight 118 bottom bracket axle dimensions.
Hi all. I just measured the 2 i have [one just arrived today from listmember Tom Ward!] and they are respectively 118.5mm and 118.7mm end to end and approx. 57mm from bearing flange to bearing flange [measured from the top outsides above the slopes]. Just sharing the info. Billy Ketchum; Chicago, IL; USA.