RogueMechanic

Campagnolo Ultra Torque Problem?

I have a theory that I want to share about the Campagnolo Ultra Torque crankset and bottom bracket system. I'm going to systematically lay out, in detail, what I believe is a design flaw, or at least, a short coming that has lead to and can cause issues. I've spent a considerable amount of time thinking this out and I have even consulted with a mechanical engineer... WARNING: This is going to be a long post and has the potential to be REALLY boring if you have zero interest in this topic.
But first, a brief overview of the design. Here's a CAD drawing.

Here's my extremely simplified description of the Ultra Torque design:
This system is designed around the Hirth joint, which joins the two semi-axles. These semi-axles are held together by a special fixing bolt. The bearings are pressed onto both of the semi-axles. Installation includes inserting the drive side of the crank into the driveside cup. It is then secured by a retaining spring. The non-drive side is then installed into the non-drive side cup with a wave washer placed on the semi-axle between cup and the bearing. The cups are supposed to be installed free of grease, with Loctite 222, hand tight. Install the fixing bolt, torque to spec, wait 24hrs (for the Loctite to cure), then off you go... Ok.. Here's the rub.

Well... not so fast. First some history.

When Campy first introduced this new system and I had the chance to install one, right off the bat, a red flag went up. What I didn't like or didn't understand is why would they design a system like that has a fixed distance between the bearings that doesn't much allow for the discrepancies in bottom bracket shell width??? I thought that I must OBVIOUSLY be missing something... But like a good little bike mechanic, I followed the installation instructions provided and completed the installation as specified ( I have to admit that I really struggled with myself when it came to the installation of the cups...). More on this later...
Fast forward sixish months and approximately 3k miles later I get a text...

John, I have a creak/knock and I think that the bb might be loose can you take a look?

It didn't take long for me to find the cause of the noise... actually in his driveway. And after a few more questions, I was heading back to my shop. What I found was to say the least, suprising.

Here's the rub.

Here's what I found. When compressing or squeezing the non-drive side crankarm laterally towards the drive side, I was able to make the whole crankset move laterally to the drive side of the bike. I could see the drive side of the crankset move out or away from the bottom bracket!! I was able to do this by squeezing the non-drive side crankarm towards the down tube or seat tube, like this (the poorly drawn red arrow vaguely shows where I was able to see the lateral movement)...

And here's a video: (Look at the area near the "center" of the crankarm and the bottom bracket cup..)

This generally is not good. This specifically, really is piss poor (not a technical term, but works well with this application).
I then repeated the same procedure on the drive-side, like this...

No movement. Rock solid.
I immediately had a really good theory about what was happening...
Ok, here goes... My theory is that because of the use of the Hirth joint, which when joined, has a fixed distance between the bearings. This doesn't allow for any discrepancy in the bottom bracket shell width. In fact, I believe that Campagnolo built in some "wiggle room" (another technical term...) to account for a certain range of shell widths. It states in the installation instructions that:

The Campagnolo Ultra Torque crankset is compatible with bottom bracket shells having the following widths:

English: 67.2mm - 68.8mm Italian: 69.2mm - 70.8mm
...that's a 1.6mm range or +/- .8mm each side of standard widths. Click here for official Campagnolo installation instructions

First, a few of my observations...

After 1-3k miles, the chances for lateral or horizontal movement increases due to the minute increases in the ID of the cups and/or the OD of the cartridge bearings. This lateral or horizontal movement towards the drive side in related to the compression of the wave or spring washer and the inability of the retaining spring to stop the movement of the system (see video 2). This occurance is probably more evident in composite frames because of the amplification of the sound or the resonating qualities of these frames. This is not to say that it’s not possible with frames made of other materials. I have just observed this issue with multiple composite frames. I found that this happens with both English and Italian bottom bracket shell designs. Two of the frames, one with English and the other Italian bottom brackets, had bottom bracket widths of 68.1 and 70.03 respectively. These measurements are pretty darn close to industry standards. So I believe that this can happen on bikes with shell widths well within normal.
Please allow me to go off on another related tangent...

Hello? Campy tech support...

Before I dove head-first into this little puzzle, I called and spoke with a kind gentleman at a large US distributor of Campagnolo the ask if he has heard of this issue. To make a long story short, he verified if I installed everything as per the instructions including the wave washer. I said that I did. He then recommended that I might add another wave washer because it is “wafer thin”…I asked if “wafer thin” is a technical term… I knew that I wasn't going to get very far info-wise, so I ordered a few to have on hand and when on my way…
While you're here, check out video 2:

The meat and potatoes

After taking accurate measurements of everything related to the bottom bracket and crankset, the only solution to this problem was to add spacers to the equation to take up the space that was allowing the movement. This had to be done to the point that there wouldn’t be any binding or side-loading of the bearings. started systematically adding spacers, starting with a .36mm spacer between the non-drive side cup and shell…

I assembled, checked for play…. Still there.
Added a .30mm spacer inside the cup between the wave washer and inside face of the non-drive side cup, reassembled, checked for play… better, but still there. Now, I thought that I was getting somewhere…
I added yet another .30mm spacer in the same location as the prior one. I then assembled again, checked for play, this time no play, or pretty darn close to no play. I was satisfied, so at this point, I disassembled it again, but this time I applied the Loctite 222 to the NDS cup threads and lubricated all of the spacers that I added.

Now, let's look at the numbers...

Bottom bracket shell width: 68.1mm
Spacer placed between NDS cup and frame: .36mm
First spacer added: .30mm
Second spacer added: .30mm
Total amount of spacers added: .96mm

This essentially adds up to the effect shell + cups width of 69.06mm. So theoretically, if you have a bike with a bottom bracket shell width of 69.6mm and you install an English Ultra Torque crankset/bottom bracket system, you won’t have the problem of lateral crankset movement.
So, the day after I deliver the bike back, I receive this text…

Perfect… 40 miles so far and no noise.

I thought, great! Problem solved… Not that I was happy about the need for the fix, but was still relieved. But wait! Not so fast… About two weeks later… another text…

My bottom bracket click has returned…

Damn… I thought, but I wasn't totally surprised. After a brief phone call, I am told that it’s not the knocking now, but a click. Back to the drawing board, but I knew that I was getting somewhere…

Round Two...

After the first fix, the knocking noise went away, but a clicking/ticking developed after < 1k miles. This mainly occured at the 6 o’clock non-drive side crankarm position when riding the bike. I was also able to produce the sound while bike was on stand. I think that this happened at the 6 o’clock position while on the bike because that is the lowest point of the power curve and most of the input force was removed from the system allowing the slight movement of the crankset to produce the click…. After closely looking at everything closely for anything that might cause a click, the only thing that was somewhat concerning was that some of the silver coating on the wave washer was rubbed off (See photo below).

I added a third .30mm spacer…Too tight. To cut to the chase, I removed a .30mm spacer and added a .34mm spacer in its place. This added .04mm to the total amount of spacers. And if my math is good, that’s a sum of 1mm. I assembled…again, and took it for a test ride…. No click. Tried to replicate the noise in the stand. Nadda. Good news.

My opinions...

1. I can’t accept this as being normal if this is the only crankset/bottom bracket design on the market that has this lateral movement... 2. I believe that the constraints of the Hirth joint and the inability to account for the normal discrepancies of bottom bracket shell widths lead to the use of both the wave washer and the retaining spring. 3. If all frames with English bottom bracket shells had exactly 68mm shell widths and if all frames with Italian bottom bracket shell widths had exactly 70mm widths and Campagnolo produced the Ultra Torque systems for those respective widths WITHOUT needing to use the wave washer and the retaining spring, there wouldn’t be this issue. 4. I think, albeit kinda far fetched, that one of the reasons why the instruction say to only tighten the cups hand tight and to use Loctite 222 is to not decrease the overall width of the shell and cups any more than it already is… We’re not talking much but as you will see, we’re not talking much anyway.

In Conclusion:

I believe that Campagnolo pigeonholed itself into this problem by incorporating the Hirth joint into the design of their Ultra Torque system. The inability of the Hirth joint to adjust for variances in shell width dimensions forced the use of the wave washer and the retention spring. Because of this limitation, they somehow agreed upon a spindle length (actually the distance between the bearings…) that was greater than the standard widths and added the washer and retention spring to make up for the range of shell widths. This is obvious because I observed this situation on a bike with a 68.1mm English bottom bracket shell as well as a bike with an Italian shell measuring 70.3mm. All of this being said, is this just me or am I missing something? I welcome any and all comments and questions. And please, correct me if I'm way off base. Thanks for checking in. -John

Clarification with an Explanation. Pt.2

"... If you're taking flack then you must be over the target..."

So, I'm going to pick up where I left off...

Now, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that by taking this position, I will more than likely upset a few folks. I guess that goes with the territory. Perhaps it would be best to break this down into two major groups. Parts and people. In reality, the two overlap somewhat… Like a Venn Diagram (Here’s a quick 5th grade math review…)

In this example, A=People and B=Parts. The overlapping middle area could be peoples' influence on parts, such as approving a design for production and sales before it has been thoroughly tested, or some yoyo improperly installing a component, etc... I think you get the idea.

I guess that I can just write about all the components and bikes that I like, and I just might do more of that. But I think that there's plenty of sunshine being blown up you-know-where on just about every site out there. Most of them are carefully written as to not upset the manufacturer who may or may not be an advertiser or sponsor.

I like to, every once and a while, share with you some of the good stuff that impresses me, and more often, I find something that frustrates me to no end. These situations sometimes boil over and end up as a post on this site. Again, let me make my intentions clear. I write this stuff with you in mind. I get hacked off just like every other person (ok... probably more...) when I have to deal with some inferior product that's dressed up as something high-quality or when someone doesn't do their job. But when I do get to writing about something, I think that a greater part of you like to "see it like it is" instead of words regurgitated from some company's marketing department.

In conclusion, my aim is to share with you my real-life experiences with products and services, in a professional manner. Wow... that sounded good. What's more than likely going to happen is an insight into my intolerance it idiocy, incompetence, apathy, mediocracy, and piss-poor design... delivered , of course, in a professional manner... You know...keeping it real. Just like you like it.       To Be Continued....

Campagnolo Ultra Torque

Is there a problem with the design of the Ultra Torque system? I really think so... Say tuned.

NEVER FORGET

Clarification with an Explanation. Pt.1

For quite some time now, I’ve been struggling with myself with regards to the “tone” or direction of my posts. In other words, how I should present things here. People who know me, for the most part, understand my thought processes and how I form my opinions.

Recently, I’ve been trying to look at my posts more objectively. What I find somewhat disheartening is that it could be easily perceived that some of my posts have a negative slant. While this is not my intention, I can see that they can be taken that way. I want everyone to realize that this is really not where I’m coming from. My objective is more in line with being an advocate for you, the end-user… the one who drops his/her hard-earned $$$ on some product or service and rightfully assumes that it will work as advertised..... To Be Continued...