ibcosmo

Hello everyone, I am changing my 1982 Della Santa from a double to a triple chainring. Having a problem finding a 70-ss x 124mm length Campagnolo bottom bracket spindle. If anyone knows the where abouts of such a spindle I would greatly appreciate it. Had found one on eBay in Poland and of course it got lost in shipping. So now I am turning to the Bike Forums members to see if they can help me out. It has a French bb but I think any Campagnolo record spindle will work. Thanks

repechage

124mm is pretty long- even the later post CPSC two ring of 115 add in an additional cog and 121-122.

I think to get that wide one would need a mtb spindle- which complicates things as many Mtb bottom bracket shells were73 mm wide

french threaded and 70? Are you positively sure your bottom bracket is 70mm wide?
french is typically 68

last note- Campag triple spindles were designed for the earlier design Record cups ( the thin cups) without the reverse spindle bore threading.

Campagnolo can be a hot mess sometimes

Bianchigirll 

I agree 124 is very long. My early '90s CampI mountain triple uses a 122. I looked at the catalog 18 (1985) last night and it shows the English triple as being 117 and the Italian as 118. After see in repechage marking a comment about the CPSC I went to Velobase and looked at the Catalog 17 from 1975 and it shows the same measurements.

I'm no expert on the brand but why would Della Santa use a French BB anyway?

What are the markings on your current cups?

SJX426 

@ibcosmo - The BB needs to match the crank. the Campagnolo Racing T takes a 115 for an Italian 70mm Shell
P1050217 on Flickr

You may need to get a triple FD as well, not to mention having a cage on the RD to accommodate the chain length.
P1050221 on Flickr

bikemig 

This is an American frame builder, right? https://www.classicrendezvous.com/USA...santa_main.htm

Isn't this a bog standard BSC bottom bracket? You could just get a shimano square taper sealed unit.

The French cups should have a marking and that will tell you the threading. You can get French cups that are swiss threaded, italian threaded, BSC, and even french threaded.

Mr. Spadoni 

Della Santa got some exposure when a local boy named Greg rode his frames and kicked a bunch of butt before heading to Europe. I hear he did okay there.

Hondo6

Don't Campagnolo square-taper cranks use ISO taper? Don't think Shimano cartidge units are made in ISO taper.

brian3069

The googler is telling me that Della Santa liked everything Italian, including bottom brackets.

Hondo6

^This.

As noted above, French-threaded BB shells are 68mm wide. Cups for those should be marked "35 x 1", "35 x P1", or something similar.

Italian-threaded BB shells will be 70mm wide. Cups for those should be marked "36 x 24" or something similar.

If the cups are marked "1.370 x 24" or something similar and 68mm wide, it's an English-threaded BB. DS will be reverse threaded.

Never even seen pictures of a Swiss-threaded BB cup, so I can't say about those markings. (If I recall correctly, Swiss are the same dimensions as French, but the DS is reverse threaded.)

bikemig 

I think you can get away with using a JIS spindle on a ISO crank:

https://www.renehersecycles.com/bott...s-demystified/

If the OP had stronglight cups, the bike quite possibly had a JIS stronglight spindle to begin with . . .

Hondo6

According to the late Sheldon Brown, you can - and he indicated he did without problems on many of his own bikes.

But if I recall correctly, he also indicated he generally avoided doing it on a customer's bike. And it also requires taking the difference into account and adjusting the necessary spindle length to account for the difference in where the crank ends up relative to the bike frame when using the "wrong" taper - which is substantial (about 4.5mm difference, if I'm reading his article on JIS and ISO BB interchangeability correctly).

In short; it adds a major additional complication. I'd avoid that if I could and try it only as a last resort. YMMV.

You could be correct about to OP's BB, if Stronglight, being JIS; dunno when Stronglight changed from ISO to JIS.

bikemig 

I believe that Stronglight was always JIS; that was the point of the piece I linked to from Rene Herse. I tend to think this is a bit oversold as a problem but you were certainly right to point it out.

The thing is the OP apparently does not know what the threading is on the bike. If the bike is Italian threaded, the Italian threaded stronglight cups are thicker which means that they can and do use the same axles as they would on a 68 mm BB. So if the OP has an Italian threaded 70 mm BB and stronglight cups, a campy axle for an Italian BB won't work very readily.

This is from the Rene Herse website:

• JIS: The old French standard, copied by the Japanese. Most Japanese cranks (but not all) and most older French cranks use this taper. René Herse cranks (new and old) use this taper.

Andrew_G

I have a 2017 Della Santa, which Roland made for me. The BB shell is Italian threaded.

Roland told me that he generally did Italian threaded BBs , but he could do English by special request. My frame moved ahead in the build queue because the customer ahead of me wanted an English threaded BB. Roland first had to buy a BB shell and then get it engraved ("Della Santa") before he could start work on that frameset.

JohnDThompson 

French threaded bottom bracket, or French manufactured bottom bracket, with potentially other-than-French-thread cups? 70mm shell suggests Italian thread, but is not definitive for Italian thread. Are there markings on the cups?

What crank do you intend to use as the triple? That may make a difference in whether what you need is just a spindle, or a whole bottom bracket.

Hondo6

The article I linked indicates that "older Stronglight" bottom brackets were ISO, hence my comment regarding not knowing when Stronglight transitioned to JIS. (I'm presuming that's correct, since the article's late author generally knew what he was talking about when it came to bicycles. ) However, the article doesn't define what constitutes "older Stronglight".

Regardless, until the OP indicates what replacement crankset he plans to use, the point is moot. The replacement crankset will dictate what spindle length and taper type is optimal.

bikemig 

[QUOTE=Hondo6;22643879]The article I linked indicates that "older Stronglight" bottom brackets were ISO, hence my comment regarding not knowing when Stronglight transitioned to JIS. (I'm presuming that's correct, since the article's late author generally knew what he was talking about when it came to bicycles. ) However, it doesn't define what constitutes "older Stronglight".

snip . . . /QUOTE]

It's not clear to me that this is right even though Sheldon is a good source. The source I linked to, Rene Herse, has good info as well. I always thought based on what I read on Rene Herse and some other sources I've read that French used JIS but maybe that's not quite right.

Post 14 above asks the right question.

ibcosmo

Hello after reading all comments I thought I had answered all. Now I realize I didn't. So using a Redclover second chainring to convert my Campy double chainring crank to a triple. As far as derailluer's go as stated I was able to jury rig the triple crank setup and both front and rear derailleurs worked well. Thanks again.

ibcosmo

Thanks SJX426 for the pictures of your triple and chain in hi and low gear position very helpful.

ibcosmo

Hello, answered all of above questions in a long post but doesn't look like it posted. So I will post again. I bought a 1982 Della Santa in 2019 from what I was told original owner. The bike had never been built, person I bought it from said a person in Texas was selling a 1983 Pogliaghi with all Campy record and super record components. I was trying to build the Della Santa period correct so Pogliaghi worked great. Everything swapped over fine and bike worked great. At 71 years old and living in the hill-mountains the 52-42 chainrings with 13-26 freewheel was a little tough. Decided to convert to a triple. Ordered a Redclover 40 tooth chainring that allows a third inner chainring to be mounted to it. It is a Campy record crank set that I'm converting. Now the weird stuff. Didn't really pay attention when swapping bottom bracket from Pogliaghi to Della Santa. When I needed a longer BB spindle to make triple spacing work I researched the forum and found what had worked for other people. Seemed a spindle length of 124mm was right. So I assumed from all I read I had a 68mm BB shell. So i found a Campy MTB BB that had English threaded cups (just needed spindle so not to concerned about cup threads ). So pull the Campy spindle out of Della Santa and it's a 70-ss spindle with 115mm length. I have a friend been in bike business for over 50 years a friend of Rolland Della Santas fo over 30 years. He sold Pogliaghi's in the 1980's. He said Rolland used Italian BB shells on his frames as did Pogliaghi. I should have stated earlier the BB is French threads 35x1 stamped on Campy cups.That should be a 68mm shell width from all I have read. The spindle that came out of the Pogliaghi and into the Della Santa is marked 70-ss. Nobody I've talked to has ever heard of French threads and a 70mm BB shell. The BB shell on the Della Santa is a Cinelli BB shell. So lets say industry standard not some off brand knockoff. The Campy MTB spindle was a 68-ss and 124mm length. Not what I needed but assembled the BB with the MTB spindle to check the spacing of chainring from chainstay. When installing the left side cup I could get it adjusted correctly but minimal threads outside of BB shell for the lockring to engage. I was able to start lockring and actually tight it. I mainly did this so I could check spacing and if the Campy super record derailleurs would handle the triple setup. Everything worked, I rode half of the Death Ride this year with this setup. It isn't right and jury rigged at best so that's why I'm looking for a Campy record 70-ss x 124mm length spindle so it's done right. Someone replied about Rollands relationship with Greg LeMond. When I bought the Della Santa frame the owner sent me a few pictures of Greg Lemond holding the Della Santa frame over his head. It was at the annual bike expo circa 2000-2001. I was pretty stoked to get pictures.

ibcosmo

So after all that I forgot to mention the Campy French threaded BB cups are not the thin cups. They have the reverse threads in the spindle opening to help keep out contamination of BB. In my research that would indicate the regular cup thickness versus thin wall cups.

ibcosmo

To Mr. Spandoni that last few sentences in my post were for you. In regards to the Della Santa Greg LeMond connection. Roland built me my first world class bike in 1977 and I was over the moon. When I went from my Peugot U08 to an all Campy Della Santa.

Hondo6

If you're absolutely sure a 5S 70mm spindle is the spindle you need, this eBay vendor appears to have it. Not an endorsement of the source; I have no connection with them other than once having done business with them. I ran across the listing looking for another fairly hard-to-find square taper spindle recently (ended up going with a different source).

https://www.ebay.com/itm/393781442919

They're in the UK, so shipping cost is borderline obscene.

They list both 5SS (34/54/37.5, 122.5mm overall - doesn't add up correctly, but that's what they list) and 5S (35/54/37.5, 126.5mm overall) spindles as being currently available. 5-coded spindles should be for a 70mm shell.

No info on manufacturer or taper for these spindles in the listing, so you might want to inquire before purchasing. Wrong taper could pose issues with either chainline or crank fit.

Edited to add:

This source also lists 5S (but not the 5SS) as being available. (Per a spec sheet I have, the 5S has the same DS length as the 5SS but a slightly longer NDS side.) They're in the US, so shipping isn't as expensive as the UK vendor. Like the UK vendor's listing, there's no info on manufacturer of first spindle (second is Hatta) or taper for either spindle in the listing so an inquiry might be prudent.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/403840253946

https://www.ebay.com/itm/394206156340

I've bought an item or two from the vendor, but have no other connection to the firm.

Mr. Spadoni 

Thanks for sharing your experience with Della Santa. For those of us who were lucky enough to be around in those days, the memories of being able to walk into a shop and see the builder, probably with torch in hand, whose name was on your frame, gave us a connection to what we rode that can’t be matched.

JohnDThompson 

Does the shell actually measure 70mm wide, or are you assuming that it is 70mm wide because you pulled a spindle intended for a 70mm shell out of it? A 70mm spindle may have been used in a 68mm shell for some arcane reason, but if the shell physically measures 68mm wide, there's no reason why you should have your heart set on a spindle intended for a 70mm shell.

N.B. French threaded Cinelli bottom bracket shells are 68mm wide and have cast-in marking to indicate the metric thread: "Cinelli S.C. FRANCE"

I suspect you may have encountered the Campagnolo "thick cup/thin cup" disparity.

gearbasher

From my understanding (aka limited research) Della Santa usually used Italian threaded BBs. And, English ones if requested. Who would want a French one? And, why?

You can face the BB shell down to 68mm. But, to me, that's like putting a tourniquet around someone's neck to slow the bleeding of a head wound.