chainring bolts - lube or loctite ?

[jungle]

I normally lube my chainring bolts for easy removal at a later date,
I've had chainring bolts without lube or loctite in the past that seized up
and had to drill them out, but just lately
I had to remove some chainring bolts which had been loctited
and had all troubles getting them undone as well.

What do others do, lube them or loctite them ?

 

[MUGEN]

Lube em, just check the bolts regularly.

 

[Binaural]

Lube them! Like you, I had a nightmare removal job when I changed my chainring last. Lube works fine as an anti-seize, and I have never had a chainring bolt fall out.

 

[FuTAnT]

Use grease to lube em on the cheap or you can actually buy specific anti-sieze compound but it's not cheap. In this application it's not really warranted however. The proper stuff is to withstand high temps while not seizing. Great for manifold bolts!

The grease acts as a retardant to them just coming out straight away if they do come loose, rather than being completely dry and just shaking out.

 

[NCR600]

Use Loctite 243

Grease prevents some corrosion, but will eventually wash out. Grease will NOT act to retard the bolts from loosening. Bolts lubed with grease are easier to tighten, and can be tightened harder than a dry bolt, at risk of overtightening, resulting in bolts snapping, breaking or stripping the thread. If you use a torque wrench, a bolt lubed with grease will also give a false reading. Likewise with anti seize.

A threadlocking compound (there are many on the market, and most are similar in chemistry to the Loctite product) will prevent corrosion by sealing water dirt & air out of the thread, meaning that if you use the correct grade you WILL be able to get the bolt undone later, prevents the bolt from loosening, and will provide the correct 'wet' torque reading if you use a torque wrench.

 

[udi]

I disagree.
Chainring bolts don't need much torque and they rarely come loose (i'm inclined to say never). Loctite will just make removal more difficult, and generous coat of grease will prevent corrosion just fine in practice. It won't eventually "wash out", i've had my chainring bolts greased for a year and upon removal they still had a healthy coat on them (and came out nice and easy to boot).

Loctite will also have negative effects on thermoplastic bashguards (e13, mrp fusion, gamut) should contact occur - such as softening, or hardening and then cracking.

Finally, grease is cheaper - save the loctite for fasteners that actually need it (rotor bolts, adaptor/caliper bolts, linkage bolts, etc).

 

[NCR600]

I disagree.
Chainring bolts don't need much torque and they rarely come loose (i'm inclined to say never). Loctite will just make removal more difficult, and generous coat of grease will prevent corrosion just fine in practice. It won't eventually "wash out", i've had my chainring bolts greased for a year and upon removal they still had a healthy coat on them (and came out nice and easy to boot).

Loctite will also have negative effects on thermoplastic bashguards (e13, mrp fusion, gamut) should contact occur - such as softening, or hardening and then cracking.

Finally, grease is cheaper - save the loctite for fasteners that actually need it (rotor bolts, adaptor/caliper bolts, linkage bolts, etc).

Loctite will have a huge negative effect on plastic in as much as it won't work at all (needs to be in contact with metal to cure). I'd also be loathe to use anything oil or solvent based either. Loctite used to do a plastic thread lock, but I don't know if it's still available, and in any case it was just a silicone based thing and was horribly messy to use.

The threadlocking aspect is merely a bonus in this sort of application, I've never had a chainring bolt come out lubed, dry or loctited, but what we're really interested in here is the prevention of corrosion, which as anyone who has had anything to do with outdoor equipment will tell you, is the best threadlocker around!

Selecting the correct threadlocker is also important here too. Loctite 222 has a negligable locking effect, and 243 slightly more. Both are designed to be undone using hand tools only, and neither will lock a thread as effectively as corrosion.

Grease might be cheaper, but it is a leading cause of the ham-fisted stripping threads and breaking bolts.

I DO NOT WORK FOR LOCTITE.

 

[udi]

Loctite will have a huge negative effect on plastic in as much as it won't work at all (needs to be in contact with metal to cure).
....
Grease might be cheaper, but it is a leading cause of the ham-fisted stripping threads and breaking bolts.

I realise it won't cure on plastic, and I didn't say that. It doesn't have to cure to damage it - I wish I had pictures - but I did a few small experiments with loctite and some plastics a while back and the results were amusing (one sample, a cd case, had a gaping hole left in it after a few days).

And your point about stripping/breaking bolts wrongly assumes that people are overtorquing chainring bolts! Hamfists overtorquing things will manage to ruin them regardless of the thread treatment used - but just to state the blatantly obvious (because I already said it once) - chainring bolts need very little torque, they don't need to be cranked down upon.

And again like I already said, grease works a charm at preventing corrosion and seizure of the bolts. You are either missing something, or really do work for loctite.

 

[arpit]

I realise it won't cure on plastic, and I didn't say that. It doesn't have to cure to damage it - I wish I had pictures - but I did a few small experiments with loctite and some plastics a while back and the results were amusing (one sample, a cd case, had a gaping hole left in it after a few days).

A general point. Always test whatever you are planning to use on the same material you are planning to use it on. For instance, CD cases are polystyrene, while bash guards tend to be polycarbonate.....

 

[Anthonaut]

I've lost a chainring bolt or two in my time.

Just thought I'd say

 

[NCR600]

I realise it won't cure on plastic, and I didn't say that. It doesn't have to cure to damage it - I wish I had pictures - but I did a few small experiments with loctite and some plastics a while back and the results were amusing (one sample, a cd case, had a gaping hole left in it after a few days).

And your point about stripping/breaking bolts wrongly assumes that people are overtorquing chainring bolts! Hamfists overtorquing things will manage to ruin them regardless of the thread treatment used - but just to state the blatantly obvious (because I already said it once) - chainring bolts need very little torque, they don't need to be cranked down upon.

And again like I already said, grease works a charm at preventing corrosion and seizure of the bolts. You are either missing something, or really do work for loctite.

What Loctite did you use? I have a CD case here all ready to go! I'd always believed the stuff was fairly inert, and I have even witnessed a Loctite rep putting a couple of drops of 243 into his tea to demonstrate how safe it was!

Look, I just like Loctite. I used to use anti seize or grease like everyone else but its messy & gets everywhere, and doesn't provide any useful locking effect. If something stays together because you Loctited it and gets you home with no worries, you'll never notice it, but you'll feel like a bit of a dill if that part fails and you've got the stuff there and you didn't use it.

Did I mention that I will happily use all six of my tiedowns on one bike for the same reason?

 

[udi]

Yeah fair call. I do use loctite generously wherever I think it is needed, chainring bolts is just somewhere I feel grease is a better choice - but to each their own. With a little bit of care you could safely use loctite inside the female bolt and not get any on the bashguard in the case of plastics anyway. But since the thread was about chainring bolts getting stuck, I just think grease is the option we're after.

A little grease on the outside of the female bolts doesn't hurt either regardless of what you use on the actual threads, as i've had chainring bolts creak on occasion making me suspect cranks, pivots and allsorts before I figured out it was just the chainring bolts.

On the CD case thing, I used 243. I had it err readily available to me back then, so while i'd like to try it again to make sure it wasn't a fluke I can't afford to. Let me know how you go. Always a sad day when my loctite bottle runs out, the stuff is expensive!

 

[t]

Maxima marine grease, inside the threads and in between the spider/rings/bolts.
that stuff doesn't wash away.

If you use a torque wrench, a bolt lubed with grease will also give a false reading.

I was taught the exact opposite; that a thread should always be lubed in order to get an acurate reading.

Reguarding Plastic bashguards reacting with chemicals, i've seen a Truvative go all pasty when it copped some overspray from aresol brake cleaner. And Petri sent me a photo a couple of years ago of a Blackspire Guard that broke in half and fell off the bike after being exposed to some kind of loctite or glue.

 

[NCR600]

I was taught the exact opposite; that a thread should always be lubed in order to get an acurate reading.

That's half right. I'm sorry if my post gave the impression I was advocating torquing bolts dry.

Torque figures, unless otherwise specified, are for a NEW bolt, straight from the box, lubricated with a protective film of light oil.

When you go slopping super slippery banana peel based anti seize goop on your threads, you reduce the amount of friction (torque) required to turn the bolt, hence you put more clamp load (tension) on the bolt than the torque reading would suggest.

Likewise with a dry bolt, you get more friction, the bolt is harder to turn and you get less clamp load for the same reading. This is why Nyloc nuts and torque wrenches don't mix well.

Loctite is formulated to provide the correct amount of lubricity to get a reasonably accurate and consistant torque/tension relationship, given that standard bolt threads vary a bit in dimension and surface finish.

 

[miko]

I've only ever had chainring bolts become loose/get lost when the cranks were brand new! Don't manufacturers check these things?

Other than that, the grease that comes on the bolts from new works fine for me. Never had problems with removal.

 

[t]

they don't like Loctite

apparently it was only a tiny ammount of 242 thast oozed out when the threads were tightened.

 

[NCR600]

That is a fine example of stress cracking there! Now I've had a chance to look through my notes and have a quick flick through my massive Loctite book, it is a known problem, and I have actually seen it before (on a large block of clear acrylic that someone drilled & tapped then applied loctite to -stupid because it would never have cured properly anyway).

I don't know what causes it, and being a bitch of a company like that, they don't say in their literature.

There would be a couple of ways around it, like actually dispensing the correct amount for the bolt (one of the things I've worked on in the past is automatic dispensing equipment for this sort of thing, and you need a LOT less of the stuff than you think) or using one of the newer waxy stick ones that don't spread as easy.

Or just don't use the stuff at all. Your choice.

 

[Danny B]

Thread dig!

Just thought I'd blow the dust off this thread and ask a related question.

Loctite on Chainring bolts. Never found it necessary in the past with Stainless Steel bolts but am upgrading to a 30T NW single which have integrated threaded sleeves (see image below). Because they're aluminium I don't want to risk over-torquing them and thought a threadlocker would be a good idea. Just wondering if I should use Loctite 222 or 243? Thoughts appreciated.

 

[Vedsy]

Just thought I'd blow the dust off this thread and ask a related question.

Loctite on Chainring bolts. Never found it necessary in the past with Stainless Steel bolts but am upgrading to a 30T NW single which have integrated threaded sleeves (see image below). Because they're aluminium I don't want to risk over-torquing them and thought a threadlocker would be a good idea. Just wondering if I should use Loctite 222 or 243? Thoughts appreciated.

I've used loctite 222, 242, 243 and nickel anti-seize for this on various pushies at various times. Although one may be "technically" better than the others for any particular situation, in the real world I've never had issues, or noticed a difference between any of them in this application.

Having said that, anti-seize is messy as so I tend to not use it unless I feel its required, 243 is recommended when there's oil or residues that can't be completely cleaned prior to assembly, in your case with a brand new chainring that's not an issue so I'd go with the 222.

 

[Danny B]

cheers! Thanks for that.

-Danny