Seized seat post and stem

[Brucey]

OK forgive me if this is B.obvious but you are allowing for the right side BB cup being left-hand threaded, aren't you?

BB units can be incredibly seized in. Heating them up using oxy-acetylene, or even 'massaging' the BB shell using a pair of hammers... there are many and various horrible techniques for shifting a seized BB.

I think the most torque I've had to use was around 400 ftlbs; at this stage I thought the frame or the tool might break at any moment.

cheers

[garygkn]

You are correct to ask. Apologies I should have included this information. I am turning in the correct direction. I had lots of help. The bb got heated up with a map gas plumbers tool. Hopefully with more leverage it should come out?

[garygkn]

Eventually got the bb out.
I used a steel pole on the end of a 24mm ring spanner.
It took a mate to hold down the back of the bike and 3 attempts with the pole at over 6 foot tall.
I had the gear hanger and frame aligned as well.

Now for the dreaded seat post.

[pwa]

Yipee!

With the seat post, if all else fails, you can saw it off and carefully file it away. It takes a long time but I have done it successfully with a post that snapped. Don't tell Brucey I said that.

[garygkn]

Yes the sawing of the seat post. I wish there was an easy tool for this? I may try ammonia first and then pop it in a vice. I think the hack saw will take me months? How long did it take you?

[pwa]

Short spells over several days, perhaps 2 hours in total. I used a hacksaw blade with a rag for a grip, and three or four different files. And a bit of cursing. A last option. I got my alloy post out of a steel tube.

[garygkn]

OK that's actually not too bad. I'll double that for me as I'm slow at these things.

[Brucey]

Yes the sawing of the seat post. I wish there was an easy tool for this? I may try ammonia first and then pop it in a vice. I think the hack saw will take me months? How long did it take you?

I have built a special saw for this job. Using it, the job usually takes about half an hour. But.... the saw cuts better, faster, than you might expect, so there is a greater risk of damaging the frame than when you use a bare hacksaw blade....

cheers

[garygkn]

Hi Brucey, any pictures of this tool or discrption? Is the tool easily fabricated? Much appreciated.

[garygkn]

Just watched this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2XEBLBQPsY

I may go straight to the hack saw method.

And this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HHtPspj6UE

[Brucey]

the tool - a special saw in fact- that I built comprises a narrow tube with a slit in it, which works as a blade holder. The slit takes a modified hacksaw blade. The slit can be closed via pinch bolts to hold the blade snug. The blade can be positioned to vary the depth of cut and there are additional stops that will also limit the length and depth of cut.

The blade holder is small enough to go up the inside of the seat pin to be cut. It is welded to an external frame so that you can hold the saw with both hands and apply a downwards pressure on the cut at both ends. Unlike a hacksaw blade used 'bare' (which works, but takes ages) you can apply about 5lbs downforce on the tip of the blade if you like, even 10" down the hole. This makes the saw work about x10 faster.

It took me quite a long time to design and make the prototype of this tool. I guess I've used it about a dozen times, including on some frames with wall thicknesses less than 0.8mm where there is really no room for error.

cheers

[garygkn]

That sounds like recipe for disaster for me. I don't have those skills. Could thine a way to it - use a round file and come a whisker away from the frame but do this twice. One canyon opposite the other?

[531colin]

Its actually easy to "ream" an alloy post out of a steel frame.
I have made "reamers" from flat wood bits (speedbit?) just using a bench grinder. If the seatpost is 27.2mm, the reamer needs to be less than 27.0mm greatest width, and tapered to smallest width to fit into the hollow post.( You need an extension bit to get all the way down a seatpost.) I can't find one in the shed, its a year or three since I did one, but this is a similar tool made to ream a large hole in one side of an alloy tube, with a centre guide peg in the other side of the tube.
It ain't pretty or precise, but its brutally efficient.

[garygkn]

That's very impressive.
I wouldn't know where to begin making that sort of tool plus I'd get the angle wrong and ruin the frame.

[Brucey]

It ain't pretty or precise, but its brutally efficient.

definitely one to use with eye protection, I'd have said... Presumably you have not used this technique with a drill bit any longer than standard? I have an extender (which secures the spade bit hex via grub screws) which ought to allow a long post to be reamed out, but I've thus far bottled out of using it for this kind of job because I'm worried about it jamming and then 'winding up' somehow before shattering...

cheers