Hi Guys

Please can someone give me some guidance.

I am fitting a BB30 to my 2011 Time NXR frame with a Sram Red Crankset. I have tried with all the spacers and with none of the spacers and everything in between but essentially as soon as I tighten the ND side crank arm up the whole set up becomes really stiff and doesn't move freely.

On the DS there is nothing only the dust cap, a fistful of grease has been used and the bearings rotate really easily until the wavy band becomes reasonably flat (not pancake flat) and the crank arm becomes nice and secure then whole thing is really stiff. T
his is the same if I use no spacers or all of the ones provided (including the MTB ones!) The only thing I am wondering is should there be any play in the allen key fitting at the end of the NDS crank arm. I can move the fitting abit with my finger if I push it as if it was on a small pivot but apart from that being broken I cant understand what is going wrong!

Cheers

Jamie

What do you mean by "doesn't move freely". Like this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUsFf4Qrqqo ?

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Scott Foil Di2 2012
Scott Scale 35 2010

Hi

Very similar except worse when tightened.

For example the crank arms wont drop if i hold them both up. They will stay in the same place!

Also a slight grinding noise!

It's not uncommon for the bearings to have a high preload when first installing the cranks. As long as the cranks are smooth on install, and rotate (relatively) freely, they will free up after a ride or two.

A grinding noise is not good, though Are you getting any binding/notchiness? How do the bearings feel when the crank is out? If they're at all rough, they may be toasted somehow. Or, the bearings may just be sitting out too far in the shell. How did you press the bearings in?

Ok that is abit more comforting.

I suppose the grinding noise is the loose crank arm when I haven't tightened it up fully.

Seems strange that bearings need time to bed in. I would have thought they would be good to go straight out of the box!

They should be, but a very slight misalignment of the bearings can cause friction which will resolve.

Still yours sounds not right as its free running until you tighten the crank down. Try this first, take all of the spacers and wave washer off and tighten both crank arms down and see what happens. It should be relatively free to turn with no grinding, but mayt have a bit of free play side to side. If it does add wavewashers and spacers as necessary to take up the slack.