Lazyass

You said the sleeve goes into a carbon shell (it goes into alu shells as well) with no plastic sleeve as a buffer. It doesn't need a "buffer" because the sleeve isn't touching anything, there's no "alloy on carbon" like you said lol. Should cartridge bottom brackets have a plastic sleeve as a buffer? Come on man, you can be sharper than that. Both sides are pressed into the shell by being screwed together. There's nothing wrong with that design, it's very simple.

Campag4life

please...don't try to engage me with your 'take'.
The design speaks to those with a background in development and not in a good way.
Glad you like it.

Lazyass

Why did you say the "aluminum on carbon" sleeve should have a plastic sleeve as a "buffer" when it doesn't touch anything? I mean you have this "background in development" so it should be an easy explanation, since I misinterpreted... something.

SundayNiagara

My favorite thread.

Campag4life

Below are some pictures from Whl Mfg installation PDF that showcases the design which is 'primitive'.
Touch anything? The 'alloy' Whl Mfg sleeve 'presses' into a 'carbon' OR Al or Ti BB shell on BOTH sides.
On the Drive Side, this design 'twists' the press together via the thread engagement in the middle between both halves and friction of the outboard drive side press is reduced by a recommended Teflon paste for 'carbon' shells. This isn't good for a carbon frame which has poor abrasion resistance in shear but also provides little assurance to not creaking as the Teflon paste is smeared when the drive side half is being twisted/pressed into place. It is tolerance sensitive...even more so than the Praxis design just in opposite planes. As a result Whl Mfg has to posture the press to be low to minimize returns of their product as this interface was never designed for a hard alloy to carbon shell interface which heightens tolerance sensitivity. Reducing press along with hard surface on surface interface without a bonding adjacent like Loctite promotes creaking. All and all a pretty poor solution.
I don't expect the layperson to look at the design and make an informed judgment. Hit/miss of a given design in a multiple of performance criteria is complex and even those trained in the discipline and do it for a living get it very wrong from time to time as in the case of original PF30 which has been problematic for years and BB30 with one and not two interfaces being slightly better. Average bike owner has no idea looking at a design whether it will work. But I do because this is what I did for a living and dues are basically paid by trial and error...learning what works and why experience matters so much.
So bandaiding PF30 to try and make it work effectively is just that...kluging a design to try and make it work.

Campag4life

Edited my above post to make it more neutral in tone and add further perspective. Also want to add a pending viable alternative to PF30 and BB30 which is basically an increased size Shimano type BB only increased in diameter to accommodate a 30mm crank spindle up from 24mm which was standard for BSA English threaded and outboard threaded integrated bearing cups. Bottom line is the continued evolution of PF30 as discussed in the post above including the now demonstrated to be creaky Praxis expanding sleeve for PF/BB30 are still inadequate for the simple reason that press fits unless Loctited are statistically prone to creak if tolerances aren't just right which probably for half of the bike population, tolerances are challenged and aggravated by strong cyclists with high pedal forces. A threaded interface is more solid.
There is a downside to this new BB which is talked about in hushed tones as being a proposed standard. Because companies like Trek, Cervelo and others want a wide BB shell for wider downtube and chainstay attachment for greater frame stiffness in torsion, and because of existing long std 30mm spindle length offered by Rotor, Campy, FSA and others...this makes the tightening flange on this new standard 'inadequately' thin for a decent spanner wrench perch and also lateral strength. No decent development engineer would ever propose this flange thickness as a clean sheet redesign. This is a kluge of being between a rock and hard place...rock is existing long 30mm spindle length (not BB30 short spindle) AND hard place are wide BB shells sold on current Cervelo and Trek bikes...major industry players. But...on 68mm wide shell bikes like Specialized and many others currently designed for BB30, this would be a simple tool change and the associated new larger 47mm standard would have a nice wide shoulder to torque cups as with current external bearing BSA BB's.
So an early criticism of yet another proposed standard that for wide shell bikes isn't ideal.
This type of compromise happens when a new standard is created to work with existing conventions like crank spindle length and current race bike BB shell width.
Proposed new threaded BB std for 30mm cranks:..watch the video in the link below if interested...
Industry launches new, larger threaded T47 bottom bracket standard ? say goodbye to PressFit!

Pic of overly thin flange width for proposed 30mm crank std when applied to wide shell bikes:

rpenmanparker 

Interesting how they say that the screw together press fit bottom brackets will work with the new frames. Why would you want to use one of those when there will be threads in the shell for screwed-in cups?

Campag4life

Robert,
Can you add more detail to your question? It isn't clear to me what you are saying.

rpenmanparker 

One if the pictures shown in the linked article is of the Enduro version of a thread-together PF30 BB adapter like the Praxis and Wheels Manufacturing versions. If I read the article correctly, they said that it could be used with the new BB standard. But it would just press into the frame threads, not screw into them. What would be the point of that?

loimpact

One of the reasons I even came across this is that I am potentially doing a new build based on a Spesh SL4 frame (thus 61mm and wanting to use Shimano crankset). As to what I hope will be a better situation than even what a standard PF30 option would be.......it looks as though I would be required to use either Praxis' delrin cups (prior to installing their collet system) or Wheels Mfg's version of spacers. (which I honestly don't like as much as Praxis' more oem-style spacers/cups)

The Praxis system showing the true oem-style cups........



The Wheels Mfg setup using only spacers/washers......



Anybody like one better than the other? (Campag, specifically )

Campag4life

Maybe you could show where in the article it says that and a pic associated with the sleeve that so called presses in versus threads in. Whole point of the new larger dia std is threads not press so agree I don't see the relevance.
thanks

Campag4life

Loimpact,
First, either solution discussed is better than beleaguered std PF30 because each have mechanical fastening for further interference to press fit.

Second, I would try not buy a PF30 bike including Spesh's narrow version which is subject to the same. So I would seek a BSA threaded bike which you can still find in the geometry you prefer typically…or worse case, a BB30 bike as BB30 can be more readily tamed for no creaking in my experience.

Third, if stuck with a PF30 bike or Spesh carbon OSBB version of PF30, I wouldn’t opt for either solution. Instead, I would press/Loctite in an alloy sleeve…FSA makes one…which will regress a PF30 bike to English threaded BSA so one can run Campy or Shimano cranks plug and play. This basically converts a PF30 bike to English threaded. A ‘semi’ permanent solution. It will stay put as you change a standard BB but can be pressed out as Loctite 609 doesn’t retain it with extreme adhesion…it can be overcome by tapping it out…but not advised maybe more than once or twice.

Here is a link to the FSA alloy sleeve I would suggest:
FSA PF30 English Threaded 68mm Bottom Bracket Adapter | Bikewagon

My thoughts…

Lazyass

Yes I'm well aware of how this design works. You didn't explain your stated need for a "plastic sleeve" on... something, nor does it appear you have any experience at all with this outboard bottom bracket assembly aside from looking at pictures. Each side appears to have an o-ring of some sort, which would be one reason for not using Loctite and seems as if it could help the creaking issue. But neither you nor I know because we haven't used them. I would like to hear from people who have actually used this and say if they have creaking issues or not. I have no interest in conjecture. If someone has an opinion that's cool but not when they come in arrogantly and try to impress with their personal biography, which is another thing I have no interest in.

rpenmanparker 

Here it is:



Conversely, any frame built around this new standard can also use existing thread-together aftermarket bottom brackets from Wheels Manufacturing, Praxis and Enduro (shown above).

Campag4life

Thanks Robert. Agree, makes no sense. Wacky journalists.

DinoShepherd

Damn, never saw that. I just got a new CX frame and used the Race Face unit. But I may like this better.

So far so good on the Race Face one, but nothing beats being able to swap an ultegra BB in and out within five minutes.

Anybody here have any field time on that adapter?

loimpact

Also.......found this thread Googling while I was actually looking at whether OSBB is actually 61mm or 61.5mm as I read both depending on where you look. (shrug)

Specialized Tarmac OSBB, Campag UT, Praxis, adaptors etc, etc ..........Of particular interest, posts number 7, 15 and 16 in that thread. (Dunbar and Butcher1 really like the Praxis system)

Campag4life

Loimpact,
Send an email to FSA and ask them about using their 68mm BSA alloy sleeve in our 61mm carbon OSBB Specialized bike. From my perspective, simply press the 68mm FSA sleeve in until its centered within the shell...the sleeve would stick out about 3mm on each side.
If this is too inelegant, for a lot more money, C-bear makes a similar sleeve expressly for those tired of living with a creaky carbon OSBB Spech (narrow PF30 bike)..and you can contact them. But grab your ankles, the C-bear BSA alloy sleeve is pricy. You can also find an installation video of the sleeve on the web.
Good luck.

loimpact

Thanks! I actually tried to e-mail and their website form no workee. So I'm gonna give them a call today. (We'll see if anybody's working today) And a couple of interesting things......

1.) You cannot find (or at least I couldn't) that sleeve anywhere on the FSA website. Heck, I couldn't even find the regular BB30 version which seems more easily found on the web in general than the OSBB version.

2.) On C-bear's site, their BB chart quick-finder actually uses "62mm" in both description and part # to describe the same thing that they show as "61mm" on the actual part itself. https://www.c-bear.com/bbchart.pdf (61mm, 61.5mm and 62mm......pretty loose tolerances for something that should probably be holding within .001" or better LOL)

3.) I'm seriously leaning toward Praxis if this frame deal happens. If for no other reason, as the most easily removed "test" piece. Because the frame I'm looking at is so valuable, it might be a ride & resell scenario for me but even if I keep it, if the Praxis solution worked well, I'd have that experience under my cap to speak first hand about it. And if not, I could go with C-bear or FSA or whoever.

As just an aside.........I noticed the FSA sleeve has a groove in it on one of the circumferences. Wonder why they insist on screwing with the press-contact surfaces. I say this because I was about ready to scream to you about the insistent use of O-rings yet again on that new T47 getup. All of those Enduro BB's shown have O-rings right smack in the middle of the press-in contact area. (The same O-rings you had me remove when I pressed in my Wheels Mfg BB to my SS EVO.....and which is still quiet as a mouse). Why do these folks INSIST on utilizing O-rings there??

Campag4life

Hi loimpact,
As to the groove, a plausible explanation is...that sleeve is spec'ed for using Loctite 609. One dynamic is..when pushing that sleeve in, that groove will capture a volume of Loctite to help it bond to the carbon shell...versus wiping all the Loctite off due to a press fit. Only speculation but seems only reason they would deliberately reduce the contact surface engagement...to improve the bond of the sleeve to the bike carbon BB shell.

As to the use of O-rings? It is a bandaid of sorts to mitigate creaking and much less effective than Loctite because as you know when you took your O-rings off, and Loctited the Wheel Mfg BB to your bike...NO more creaks. With proper Loctiting, a BB as it turns out 'can NOT' creak. Creep = creak.

So why O-rings? Three reasons come to mind:

One...promotes an easier build because the tolerance can be increased...or another way of putting it, the design can tolerate a higher part dimensional variation and the nominal target for sleeve O.D. can be reduced so that all sleeve and bike combinations will build without excess press thereby reducing warranty returns. An O-ring is an elastomer that will compress. to accommodate a wider build tolerance. Tolerances are expensive and bike BB's vary...virgin carbon PF30 hole diamters in particular compared to BB30 which can be held tighter...and high tolerance builds can promote creaking because of excessive movement.

Two...marketing. Companies like Praxis and Whl Mfg spec' O-rings 'in lieu of' Loctite because Loctite is the boogie man when it comes to selling products. If a consumer can stay away from the witch craft of Loctite they will. Only problem is...Loctite by far works best...to tame a press fit, so even though these companies may sell more products by trying to work around the use of Loctite as their spec, they piss a lot of customers off for selling a creaky product...as noted in some Praxis owner' complaints about creaking. Far from all customers will have an issue. A bell curve of build tolerance and even rider strength. Praxis BB's are now being found out to be dodgy for creaking as well with same issue as BB30 with metal on metal interface. Loctite helps quiet them as well and of course Praxis and Wheel Mfg neither spec Loctite for their BB's and of course many have learned this is the only way to effectively make them quiet.

Three..an O-ring naturally damps sound propagation because softer rubber/plastic polymers have a much lower speed of sound aka resonant frequency compared to either metal sleeves or a carbon bike with pure carbon BB. Carbon as many know who have owned carbon wheels...has a very high sound propagation which amplifies everything and a contributing condition to creaking many complain about.

In summary O-rings are spec'ed as a whim and a prayer for greater build forgiveness and 'theoretically' mitigate sounds as sound dampers..the latter being more whim than substance...but above are some considerations about the design of each.

Loctite quiets them all however in the case of original PF30, Specialized and many other companies with this ill fated BB design struggle(d) with keeping them quiet as gluing plastic bushings in place and to metal bearings in particular is problematic and why Specialized ultimately discontinued their carbon OSBB even after spec'ing Epoxy to bond their plastic bushings to their Sworks carbon shell frames.

A footnote. Shame on the industry for perpetrating such a horrible design on the public who struggled (and continue to struggle)with this type of BB. Companies like Praxis and Wheel Mfg, C-bear and several others in fact exist to try and 'right the wrongs' of the industry by offering products that 'attempt' to correct these design flaws. An outrage really on an expensive race bike...largely spawned by greed by bike companies to set themselves apart from their competitors...creating a bogus difference purported as an 'advantage' like weight and stiffness...to 'market' the superiority of their bikes when in actual fact, the opposite is true and these miniscule differences have a severe downside in reliability.


My thoughts...

loimpact

Campag,

A couple more questions......

1.) I know you said before the 609 is designed for an "abrupt" break of the bond when removing. I can certainly understand the need in any of these new threaded types when going into a true BB30 alloy but still, even though you can certainly give the ND side a "pop" when knocking it out, the DS has to be unscrewed first. Does 609 tolerate that slow break of the bond ok?? (i.e. enough for repeated R & R over time?) And would there be any difference in approach from the BB30 vs PF30??

And here's a 2nd parter........If using the Praxis sleeve and you did approve of using 609 there......in a 61mm OSBB setup, would you like to see 609 from the sleeves to shell and Praxis BB to those sleeves?? (Keeping in mind, of course the sleeves are Delrin & not alloy) Or just one or the other?? Or neither?

2.) This kind of goes hand-in-hand with above......You mentioned that you'd only like the FSA BSA sleeve pressed in/out once or twice even using 609. Any particular reason why it wouldn't be able to share the same repeated R & R as any other sleeve aforementioend???

Thanks again

Campag4life

couple more questions......

1.) I know you said before the 609 is designed for an "abrupt" break of the bond when removing. I can certainly understand the need in any of these new threaded types when going into a true BB30 alloy but still, even though you can certainly give the ND side a "pop" when knocking it out, the DS has to be unscrewed first. Does 609 tolerate that slow break of the bond ok?? (i.e. enough for repeated R & R over time?) And would there be any difference in approach from the BB30 vs PF30??

Ans:
First off, Loctite won’t necessarily do much good with the Praxis sleeve with a plastic bushing. Loctite just doesn’t bond that great between plastic and metal. You could try it, but Loctite would be much more effective for BB30 + Praxis sleeve…metal on metal.
But to answer your question about release or disassembly with Loctite with a threaded connection. A levered force using the pitch of a fine thread as a fulcrum will ‘easily’ overcome any Loctite 609 bond. No worries at all there. Leverage/torque is huge for disassembly with a spanner and will easily break any bond.
A nuance is…and this is very subtle…even though a PF30 bike like you have would be less likely to creak with Praxis than BB30 with no Loctite, a PF30 has a much higher probability of creaking with a Praxis sleeve than BB30 + Praxis Sleeve + Loctite.
Plain and simple, BB30 + Loctite isn’t going to creak with or without a sleeve. PF30 is a problematic design that is helped if narrow plastic bushings are ‘eliminated’…and even then still a challenged design unless a BB like Wheel Mfg is bonded right to the carbon shell with Loctite. An alloy Whl Mfg BB without 0-rings + Loctite will be quiet if bonded to a carbon shell PF30 bike. Narrow plastic bushings by contrast with or without Loctite are problematic and why Specialized discontinued that BB after much too long and too many customer noise issues.


And here's a 2nd parter........If using the Praxis sleeve and you did approve of using 609 there......in a 61mm OSBB setup, would you like to see 609 from the sleeves to shell and Praxis BB to those sleeves?? (Keeping in mind, of course the sleeves are Delrin & not alloy) Or just one or the other?? Or neither?

Ans: Honestly Praxis + narrow plastic bushings + 61mm narrow PF30 Spesh bike + Loctite is not a good match. Loctite doesn’t effectively bond to plastic very well. I wouldn’t choose this combination with a Sworks 61mm carbon OSBB aka narrow PF30 bike personally. I would avoid it.

2.) This kind of goes hand-in-hand with above......You mentioned that you'd only like the FSA BSA sleeve pressed in/out once or twice even using 609. Any particular reason why it wouldn't be able to share the same repeated R & R as any other sleeve aforementioend???

Ans: Because the press is more invasive. With Praxis, the sleeve expands into place and not pressed latterally through the BB shell wiping the carbon hole in shear. Even with the plagued Whl Mfg design I critiqued, the press has to be postured lower to get it together because it can be due to threaded retention and even then virgin carbon fiber was never designed to be a pressed surface as it doesn’t have great abrasion resistance in shear. So if you decide to opt for a FSA or C-bear sleeve, do so with deliberation to keep it as a BSA bike until you sell the frame where you may want to push it out as few will buy a high end frame with this sort of installation IMHO…I wouldn’t but perhaps others would. I personally won’t own a Sworks Specialized bike in fact because of the BB type but would in 2016 when they went BB30 because it is much more manageable. BB30 is descent just like Trek and Cervelo’s can be tamed with Loctite as well as they have alloy bore cups bonded to carbon shells just like BB30 only wider apart. A threaded BB bike is still the ticket IMO and if digging around even Spesh sells these…I believe the 2016 Roubaix Expert maybe available in BSA and that is a superb frame with 10r carbon. Just need to avoid their top Sworks frame or even their Pro to stay away from BB30 which is much better than their discontinued narrow PF30…sorry…what you have. If you haven’t bought that frame, I wouldn’t btw…this wasn’t clear to me…but sounds as though you were considering it and didn’t own it.

Hope that helps.

loimpact

Well to be honest it's still a "maybe" because I've tentatively purchased the frame for a song and I'm happy to build it and confident of a solution (just as with my EVO ultimately) but I'm assuming the seller is legit. If it falls thru I won't be heartbroken.

One more question.......(and I meant to include this earlier).....

Why did Spesh ever create the 61mm width to begin with? About the only reason I can come up with in my mind is that concentricity and thus tolerance might be a little more repeatable for said diameter at a shorter distance apart but still......why not just make it the same (or heck go up to 70mm and create your own proprietary standard and call it "better" while still allowing folks to use std cranks). I know "we're different" might be the case but that wud be truly foolishness, imho, if they weren't making any improvement on the design.

*If* this frame deal goes thru and based on thinking about what you've said, I think I actually *would* go with Wheels Mfg version as its spacers don't interfere with the BB to shell interface and I'd go ahead and 609 that in creating what I think I would feel best about and knowing by my own firsthand experience that the alloy to bare carbon BB connection can be well silenced as is with my EVO. (Logical plan?)

Campag4life

As it turns out, Spesh makes their own crank which is a knock off of the Lightening design with Hirth joint. Spesh's carbon versus alloy OSBB have the same spacing. How is this with a 61mm carbon shell with their carbon OSBB aka narrow PF30? Its because the proprietary delrin bushings that Spec use protrude 3.5mm on a side for net bearing spacing of 68mm for both BB types they sell.

You made a good comment about why 61mm. I believe many have wondered including me. Don't think its tolerance related. Again spacing was the same so Spesh could use the same crank on both BB types. It maybe to keep alternative BB's from being mounted off the shelf PF30 thereby robbing their BB part sales. It didn't work tho. Notably because Spesh's BB turned out to be crap. But of course aftermarket companies perceived a demand for improving upon Spesh's narrow BB and came out with alternatives which may have defeated Spesh's premise to sell their products.
Creation of proprietary BB's is a cottage industry or a bad soap opera...seems more like the latter than the former.
As to your last sentence...yes, I would say a Logical plan. Loctite + alloy Wheel Mfg BB + pure carbon shell should work just fine as you discovered.

Good luck.

SundayNiagara

I have been following this thread with fear and trepidation over the bottom bracket issue. I am in the market for my first road bike and there are plenty of cool-looking bikes in my price range. The one bike that stands out, is the 2016 Felt Z5. Why? Because it has a threaded bottom bracket and rim brakes, is mostly 105 AND DI2 ready. I will finally be looking at one this week.

PS: The only thing I'm not crazy about, is the color.