Originally Posted by bikemig

The stein tool is great and well worth owning. The problem is the spanner. I've had good luck with a 15 inch crescent which will set you back considerably less than a $100 (post 32). The back up is the Sheldon Brown tool described above (post 5).

By the way, I have a 70s era Mercier 300 in the build queue. It came to me with a VO bottom bracket and a stronglight 99 crank. The two worked well together.

Originally Posted by merziac

This usually gets a discussion going with the debate about who's method is the best one.

Seems odd to me as I have never had a fixed cup that was not standard size, I have several wrenches but my go to is my Sugino that I have had for 45 years, it never fails me.

I have a foolproof process that never fails or damages any tools, parts, frames or flesh, period.

It requires a couple of things that are very common aside from a proper wrench.

The direction in the pics is off depending on direction you're going but with this it doesn't matter, if you're going the wrong way it will "crack" loose then you reverse direction and spin it off, easy, peasy.