Maybe I shouldn't have ignored that persistent creak...

[moose8]

On my ride home from work last night I gave a nice hard pedal stroke when something felt weird - turns out the crank had fallen off, and since there was a bus right behind I just got off the road as quick as I could while the bus rode over the crank, but thankfully didn't hit it with its wheels. The crank had been creaking for probably a month, but I thought it was the pedal, and I kept intending to clean and regrease everything but hadn't gotten around to it. Whoops.

[Fishbike]

Glad to see that you were able to take the photo while vertical. With so many ways for bikes to creak and squeak and click and rub and skip and stick and slip, it is easy to ignore some of those warning signs. Lesson to us all. Glad the mishap wasn't worse.

[MattTuck]

Glad you're ok. Could have been much worse. The bike is easy to fix or replace... YOU, not so much.

[redir]

Yikes :eek:

Yeah that could have been worse heck you could have been thrown under the bus.

[tv_vt]

Looks like that chain could use a little oil, too!

Glad you're ok.

[moose8]

Looks like that chain could use a little oil, too!

Glad you're ok.

The chain is a mess for sure. Again, it's been on my list of "need to change." Boston winters are hard on a bike, and I ride this one in the worst of the worst so that my other bikes don't get all ruined by salt and road crud, plus it's really fun to ride when the snow and slush are covering the road (it's a surly 1x1 with fattish tires). Then every spring I give it a good cleaning and usually have to replace the chain. Living on a fifth floor walk-up makes the messier aspects of bike maintenance a little tricky though, so I end up putting it off far longer than I obviously should.

[ultraman6970]

You never check the bolts???

Then some say UT is a bad system, this would not happened with UT ;P

[avalonracing]

My friends give me a hard time because other than the sound of a clean chain running over gears no sound is allowed to come from my bike. (Hey we all have our OCD issues with something). But this really does give me piece of mind as well because keeping it sound free requires careful maintenance and inspection. I do things like run the lightest film of grease on the spacers between the cogs, on cable ferrels, where chainring bolts come in contact with the chainrings etc.
That said even though I do my best to keep the bike quiet and safe things do sometimes just fail like when a chain just broke under load on a climb last year throwing me to the ground.

[distanc3]

oh gosh, good thing you're ok

[blessthismess]

I had a creaking on the drive side pedal for the last two weeks.Finally replaced it today. No more noise and a lot more peace of mind :) I agree with avalon about bike noise. I cant believe I made it that long with out fixing it!

[moose8]

What's a little inconsistent with me is with my road bike(s) I am borderline obsessive on keeping everything running smoothly and quietly and would never abide any noise. This bike is one I ride day and day out regardless of the weather, and is the only one I commute on in bad weather. I have a big front paul flatbed rack for grocery shopping (but mostly beer fetching) and just use it for pretty much whatever. It also weighs about a metric ton, so bringing up to my apartment for cleaning/servicing is unappealing. But I'd say lesson learned and I won't be so lax in the future just because it's my knockaround bike.

[206campyrick]

Loose crankarms are a common problem with the FSA Gossamer cranks, which this looks like it is. Make sure you use blue loctite on the crank arn retention bolt and properly torque the crank arm fixing bolts. Once its come loose, its more prone to again.

[d.vader123]

Just curious, but how often do you maintain your bike? In other words, how often do you degrease chain then regrease chain, stem, seatpost, tighten bolts, and overall clean bike frame?

[moose8]

Just curious, but how often do you maintain your bike? In other words, how often do you degrease chain then regrease chain, stem, seatpost, tighten bolts, and overall clean bike frame?

It had probably been about a year on the calendar, but I was on a job assignment for 6 months where I didn't ride it. So it was really probably about 4 or 5 months of actual use of this bike since I had a bike shop replace the bottom bracket and since I had given it a good cleaning. The chain I pretty much ignore as it's a singlespeed/IGH (depends which wheels I'm using) so I've never noticed any degradation in its performance no matter how crappy it looks and I occasionally lube it but usually just replace it after every winter. The slush and salt does seem to do a number on the chain and bottom bracket/crank area (the bolts everywhere in the drivetrain rust pretty much immediately in the winter) and cleaning it every time I go to work or go home on it isn't practical. But I do very little maintenance on the bike. Obviously not enough. This is the first time anything like this has happened though - other than bottom brackets I've never had any issues until this.

The cranks are Surly Mr. Whirly - it was the anniversary 1x1 rat ride from a few years ago.

[Bikerist]

This is exactly why I change both my cranks every 6 months!