phoenix_thompson4•19d agoProlific Poster

Bearing press drift after 20 years, old cups fought back

I've been wrenching since the 90s, and this past Saturday I swapped out a headset on a 1998 Trek. My old bearing press has never let me down, but the lower cup just wouldn't seat straight, kept catching on a burr. After 3 tries, I grabbed a socket that was 0.5mm smaller than the cup and used it as a drift, tapped it around the edge with a dead blow. It seated clean with a satisfying thunk, guess my days of trusting the press alone for crusty old bikes are done. Anyone else keep a random socket set just for stubborn cups like that?

1 comments

1 Comment

anna_ross1918d ago

Yeah, that hit home for me. I always figured a good press was all you needed, but after fighting a seized bottom bracket cup last year, I grabbed an old socket and it worked way better than I ever expected.