Tag: crank

April 25th – A recovery day, mainly resting and pottering around attending to mechanical issues with the bikes. Long-term readers will remember my bizarre crank failure last spring, and at the time I suggested I’d never see it again: well, I was wrong. 

This is an identical Lasco crank from my other bike. There are clear cracks growing either side of the pedal mount bore. Thankfully, I had a spare so changed it over on discovery, hopefully forestalling an unexpected failure.

I‘m not sure if this is a poor design, manufacturing failure or a sign that I should lose some weight…

Aprill 11th – Before I do the usual ones today, tonight I had a nightmare journey home after a less than wonderful day. A couple of consecutive punctures (with different causes) were bad enough. But then, not far from home (thankfully), I gained another entry for Bob’s Big Book of Bizarre Bicycling Mechanical Failures™ – my non drive side crank sheared at the pedal thread. Clean off.

I have never seen this before. Not once.

It felt bad for a couple of miles – I figured a pedal bearing was going south. It felt odd, eccentric. This prepared me for disaster, so when it happened it didn’t hurt or cause me to fall off, but it could have been quite bad. 

The crank is by Lasco, and has done 10,000 miles. From the dark patch on the break, I’d say it’s been cracked awhile. I’m no small fella and fatigue has clearly worked it’s magic.

Oh well. Time for a new chainset, then…