Can't say I understand why there is so much anger on here. This is something I did to solve my problem, There might be an easier solution, but nothing I considered (and yes I did consider sawing it) was as safe to the frame and easy as what we did do. Try a piece of advice from my granny, "If you can say something nice..." you've heard it. I am open to constructive criticism but I will remove comments with inappropriate language and block those users. Your derision (look it up) is not welcome.
It worked! saved my ass in a couple of ways, saved the frame and saved me telling my wife the bike I bought on Ebay (that she said not to get because there could be something wrong with it) was junk. Thank you for posting this!
2002crewbus I recall the first time I dropped a piece of the seat post into the lye solution. The reaction was so energetic and I knew this was how we could save this beautiful frame. Glad it worked out for you.
@@fortyforfree next to Rivendell, Bruce Gordon made the best touring frames ever. He is now retired and my wife rides a work of art. You are just showing how much you want for bicycle knowledge.
Until you are stuck with this problem of an ALUMINUM Seatpost and a STEEL frame and try your pipedream ideas and succeed, hold your comments about how to fix it to yourself. I am extremely grateful to the makers of the video for a solution which actually works and works easily to boot. With that said thank you for your video Mr. Richardson!!
Indeed Jim! You are an observant fellow. Since I hope this video is instructional I will give a detailed response to this.The sandals were a deliberate choice! OK, the suit itself is a tyvek coated with PVC impervious to alkaline (Lye) but not heat. The suit is also closed on the bottom (it has feet) so my feet were protected. The sandals are neoprene, again impervious to lye. The sandals just protected the bottom of the suit, and my feet, from the ground. Had I worn work boots the lye, if spilt, would have reacted with the leather of the boot creating enough heat to give me second degree burns, enough heat to melt the pvc and compromise the suit. The result is my feet are turned into soap! (that's bad) Even neoprene work boots (which I don't currently own but did when I worked in hazmat) have organic linings resulting in the same catastrophe. So yeah a $5 pair of sandals was the best footwear choice.
$1500 frame, $20 seatpost. Saving the post was never on my agenda. I used Kroil in place of WD40. I tried heat, I even tried compressed CO2 to flash cool the post in an attempt to shrink it. This really wasn't my first rodeo. Oh, I made really sure the new post wouldn't seize. I honed the seat tube with a brake cylinder hone and greased it up real good.
What volume of lye crystals did you mix with your 500mL of water? Also, what was the piece you used to form the lower part of your makeshift splash guard?
You should be able to get lye crystals at your local hardware store. You may need some small rubber plugs to close the vent holes between the BB shell and the down tube. You will also need to clamp some sort of hose on the down tube and something to pour the mixture into.
Ahh, the crystal meth...od. In all seriousness, these things are the real deal. RJ the Bike Guy had to use an 8 tonne jack because a 2 tonne wasn't enough - as in, it takes the weight of a bus to remove these. A flippin bus. Any new alloy seatpost should be anodized, installed with some oil, (like 30w or something) and moved every so often so you don't have to repeat this process.
If only the previous owner(s) of the frame had greased the seat post; prevention is better than cure. I've watched no end of videos on removing stuck seat posts but a lot of them call for specialist equipment that the average person is unlikely to have. Using lye (caustic soda in the UK) is relatively quick and cost effective. Although it won't damage steel it is messy and as shown in the video care should be taken when using it.
Nice video. Now, I know what to do next time with out ruining the paint. Had the same happen on my favorite Specialized Hardrock MTB. Heating the frame with an Oxygen Propane Torch until it was cherry red did the trick but it also cooked the paint off. Now it's ugly and not my favorite anymore. Did not try cutting the seat post but I suppose it might work if a hack saw blade were able to fit inside tube and were able to cut the tube length wise. Thank you for sharing.
OK, read carefully, I clamped the clamp onto a vise and broke the bond so the clamp came out of the post. I put the frame in professional bike work clamp anchor to a wall, braced the rest of the frame so it wouldn't move. Clamped the seat post in a jaw designed specifically for its size, Attach a six foot pole to the clamp and pulled down slowly. The post broke, away from where it was clamped, spiral fracture! Damnedest thing I ever saw!! When I say we tried everything...we tried everything!
how long did you let the post sit with penetrating oil before you tried all that?
11 ปีที่แล้ว +2
Great solution! This will come in handy one day. Have had this problem already three times and so far have gotten them all out except one on my brothers bike. Good to know that I'll be able to move it when it is needed.
Max Lindner This is a Bruce Gordon Rock and Road frame. Short of Rivendell but one of the better touring frames made. The worth is debatable, the retail is about $2300 (american? yup!)...and i'll take every BG frame you got for $10 each.
Max Lindner No worries, it didn't look like much when we got it. Pulled all the old components, got that pesky seat post out, had it powder coated and rebuilt up with new components and it's a show piece. It is also a very nice riding bike according to my wife who now tours on it.
Walter Richardson Nice job man! I come from the mountainbiking corner with fat aluminum frames etc. which is why I thought this frame was a dinosaur in the first moment :D
Same thing happened to me... I attacked it with hammer and a flat head screw driver with a full can of WD40 :D After 2 hours the post was unstuck, undamaged frame and the seat post, but my shoulder was hurting me for about 2 days more... The damn thing taught me a lesson about greasing the post, which I never did :) Now, I'm still using the same frame and the seat post...
I don't remember the concentration. I think I mixed as directed for full strength. I'll post again if I find the container but it is stored somewhere. The collar is a step down rubber plumbing joint with hose clamps. 2" to 1.5" I think and the bottom clamp was wound up to crush it it onto the seat tube.
well done...excellent video friends.......but l fear for the original paint of my KHS steel frame if l try this.....l don´t know...can anybody tell me if the steel tube got heated by the reaction and the paint is also fucked up ?....thanks for posting😉👽
Waltor Richardson & Co, -Thanks for the instructional video on the 'Chemical Method', I too tried everything until I was left with just a stump of a post stuck inside the seat tube... will buy lye and get back to you. I am either going to do this or find a 27.2 reamer, frankly I thing this chem. method is safer on a steel frame since I 'slipped' with the cold-chisel and screwdriver trying to bang out the broken post.
just got a great idea by this. get a couple large long drill bits, expensive though, might be around thirty bucks for a few three different sizes. just bigger than the hole of inner part of post. then start your drilling, use one, then next than next. and then BOOM, it'll just crack when its thin enough. instead of taking a chance or worrying if that stuff might ruin your frame. But good job, it worked.
at least 30 bucks for the bits. I have many friends that have tried your method the only ones that were successful used a drill press they had to borrow from a bike frame manufacturer because most other drill presses wont have the clearance for a frame. Lye dissolves aluminium, cannot hurt steel. Drilling or sawing has a far greater potential of damaging a steel frame. Why does everyone insist I did this the hard way and some brute force method would have been so easy?
Walter Richardson I'm running into this problem right now. I'm going to be trying the lye solution outside but I don't have a bike stand. I have a few questions: 1) How did you clog the BB hole up? 2) Did the solution end up damaging any of the paint? 3) Was the plastic fitting an absolute must? What components do you use? I see a worm clamp but I've no idea what else I should get.
bluewker 1. I bought a couple of rubber plugs at a local hardware store but i didn't need them because this frame has no vent between the seat tube and the BB shell (first time I'd ever seen that actually) 2. it generates quite a bit of heat so your paint could bubble, we had already planned to have it powdercoated so we didn't care. 3. the reaction is pretty violent and without the thing on top it would splatter a lot. I used a length of pvc pipe and a rubber step down collar. If you do what I did just go to the hardware store and wander around in the plumbing section until you find something that will work.
fantastic video, thank you for posting it, very helpful. Yes, the naysayers and critics in the comments section are quite gratuitous, and unfortunately have become de rigueur in unmoderated forums. Still, thank you. I will attempt this shortly. I don't want to blister my paint, and I hope it doesn't.
January/21/2015 I just remove a stubborn seatpost from my road bike -trek 360 I hammer it/heat it/out wd 40-nothing-and I work on it for hours finally I went to my garage -turn on my 60 gallon compressor and hook my air hammer-I had it out in about 5 minutes(if u wait for your compressor to fully charge it will tale less time to get it out if u don't have a compressor-which bike shops don't have if u have a friend who has one-or u can take to a mechanic shop-let them know what u want-and that then can use their air hammer-hopefully they wont charge u lot. if I had a vice- I would I would have taking the seatpost in a minute-try people-it WORKS
My aluminum bottom bracket drive side cup is seized onto my carbon fiber frame. Getting desperate and hoping I could go chemical but afraid this solution or caustic soda would damage the carbon? Any insight would be greatly appreciated! Thanks
OK, My number one piece of advice is: Don't take mine or anyone else's word for it when an expensive frame is on the line. You can perform experiments to make decisions for you. I would get a carbon fiber spacer for a headset which you can get online and slide the spacer over a piece of aluminum tubing snugger fit the better. Drop that into some lye and see if the carbon fiber is damaged. My guess is this is not the way you want to do this. I believe the carbon fiber would be damaged by the heat. Steel is more resilient but when we did our think there was enough heat to blister. I do know that carbon fiber alone will not react, but the heat of the reaction with the aluminum is I THINK beyond the tolerance of the Carbon fiber. Take your frame to a high end bike shop, I bet they have seen this before. We only did what we did after consulting with 3 different bike mechanics who all told us it was sad but we were going to have to throw a Bruce Gordon frame away.
Lye crystals, a rubber plumbing joint that steps down so the smaller diameter fits on the seat tube and is clamped on with a hose clamp. A short length of pvc pipe to give the solution some room to bubble away. In most frams you will have to plug the vent holes that pass from the seat tube to the bottom bracket shell or your solution will just run out. I got some little rubber plugs at the hardware store but then found there were no vents. The fumes are irritating and explosive so do it outside.
Also happened to me but in the aluminum frame and the carbon tube. I put wd40 between the tube and the aluminum frame (enough) to let it absorb and then fastening the frame and turning the seat it released. After taking off, I cleaned and re-lubricated both the carbon tube and inside the frame with wd40 and it was perfect. There was no need to cut or break anything.
Really why do they make bikes that have ali and steel mixed like this look what a problem it causes i bet numerous people have got so frustrated by it that theyve has no option but to throw a good bike away. Its an absolute nightmare but it s good to see you got a good result and wernt beaten What was that chemical that you were using? Am i right in thinking that it literally melted the alloy away or something?
+christopher benson Yes, it was Sodium Hydroxide commonly called "lye" it dissolves aluminum with violent reaction. It isn't melting so much as it dissolves the chemical bonds that give aluminum the physical quality of metal. You're left with a slurry of aluminum salts.
The aluminum chemically welds to the bare steel. It's counterintuitive, but you can just put some light grease on the post to prevent that bond from forming between the post and the tube. Also Park and other companies sell anti-seize compounds specifically to keep this from happening, but it's way too late once it's stuck...
to our surprise there were no weld vents in the BB shell so we didn't have to. I bought a rubber stopper i was going to plug the vent with but I didn't need it. If you want to try this, lye wont react with rubber or plastic so you can plug it.
After watching this video I decided to try and use this technique to remove to aluminum that friction welded to the journal on a crank shaft. It works.... Thanks for posting, great video. ( but you still remind me of Breaking bad )
lol, dressed up better than anyone who ever attempted to mass produce some deadly chemical agent or secret biochemical bacteria, and then goes and wears saddles!!!! Boy 'o Boy, you just gotta laugh - but thank you all the same, it is indeed a very effective method to solve this problem :)
+The_ Pentaquark. Yes someone made the same observation over a year ago. I gotta laugh because the joke is on you! if you had even bothered to read other posts you would see that neoprene sandals are non-reactive to lye, not sure why people want to think Im an idiot but I guess we are now living in a world where facts no longer matter. Why didnt I wear boots or something? read this cut and paste from last year...I await your apology -You are an observant fellow. Since I hope this video is instructional I will give a detailed response to this.The sandals were a deliberate choice! OK, the suit itself is a tyvek coated with PVC impervious to alkaline (Lye) but not heat. The suit is also closed on the bottom (it has feet) so my feet were protected. The sandals are neoprene, again impervious to lye. The sandals just protected the bottom of the suit, and my feet, from the ground. ;Had I worn work boots the lye, if spilt, would have reacted with the leather of the boot creating enough heat to give me second degree burns, enough heat to melt the pvc and compromise the suit. The result is my feet are turned into soap! (thats bad) Even neoprene work boots (which I dont currently own but did when I worked in hazmat) have organic linings resulting in the same catastrophe. So yeah a $5 pair of sandals was the best footwear choice.
my apologies, I thought everyone had a pair of wellington boots lying around somewhere - 100% PVC or Natural Rubber are pretty cheap and easy to come by; Here in the UK it's quite often wet/raining, so not so unusual to have a pair knocking around somewhere. P.S. Your logic is sound - thanx for taking the time to explain - it just looked a little odd, that's all :)
@@waltor5849 It's true; the American English past tense form is spelled. In other varieties of English, both spelled and spelt are common. ... The past tense of the verb “spell” can be spelt in two ways. Forgot you were in the colonies.
I suggest you read some of the other comments about this issue. The flip flops are neoprene and impervious to lye, I am not wearing socks! the PVC coated hazmat suit has feet. A complete discussion of this issue in answer to Jim McDowell two years ago.
Can't say I understand why there is so much anger on here. This is something I did to solve my problem, There might be an easier solution, but nothing I considered (and yes I did consider sawing it) was as safe to the frame and easy as what we did do. Try a piece of advice from my granny, "If you can say something nice..." you've heard it. I am open to constructive criticism but I will remove comments with inappropriate language and block those users. Your derision (look it up) is not welcome.
It's Breaking Bad...Tour de France version
It worked! saved my ass in a couple of ways, saved the frame and saved me telling my wife the bike I bought on Ebay (that she said not to get because there could be something wrong with it) was junk. Thank you for posting this!
2002crewbus I recall the first time I dropped a piece of the seat post into the lye solution. The reaction was so energetic and I knew this was how we could save this beautiful frame. Glad it worked out for you.
I need help saving a bike I bought off Fb marketplace. Lol
@@fortyforfree next to Rivendell, Bruce Gordon made the best touring frames ever. He is now retired and my wife rides a work of art. You are just showing how much you want for bicycle knowledge.
Until you are stuck with this problem of an ALUMINUM Seatpost and a STEEL frame and try your pipedream ideas and succeed, hold your comments about how to fix it to yourself. I am extremely grateful to the makers of the video for a solution which actually works and works easily to boot. With that said thank you for your video Mr. Richardson!!
oh shut up. your comment ads no value. another way is to use boiled water.
you could drill it out too.
you can use the gallium aluminium trick too.
or you could just melt it out.
oh. I see. they etched it out. wtf. good.
@@snorttroll4379 Gallium is expensive.
All of that protective gear and sandals?
Indeed Jim!
You are an observant fellow. Since I hope this video is instructional I will give a detailed response to this.The sandals were a deliberate choice! OK, the suit itself is a tyvek coated with PVC impervious to alkaline (Lye) but not heat. The suit is also closed on the bottom (it has feet) so my feet were protected. The sandals are neoprene, again impervious to lye. The sandals just protected the bottom of the suit, and my feet, from the ground. Had I worn work boots the lye, if spilt, would have reacted with the leather of the boot creating enough heat to give me second degree burns, enough heat to melt the pvc and compromise the suit. The result is my feet are turned into soap! (that's bad) Even neoprene work boots (which I don't currently own but did when I worked in hazmat) have organic linings resulting in the same catastrophe. So yeah a $5 pair of sandals was the best footwear choice.
Walter Richardson - That was a hilarious and sound reply! :) I guess the moral is don't underestimate a good sandal!
He was wearing socks though !
Ok, My wife and I sat down at the beginning of the summer and binge watched Breaking Bad (never saw it before)...I get it now.
I'm out of options, I'm going to try this, Thank you for going thru all the work to make the video.
These are quite definitely the most comprehensive preparations I have seen for this method. Also the best video on the subject out there. Thank you.
Grease your seatpost everybody!
$1500 frame, $20 seatpost. Saving the post was never on my agenda. I used Kroil in place of WD40. I tried heat, I even tried compressed CO2 to flash cool the post in an attempt to shrink it. This really wasn't my first rodeo.
Oh, I made really sure the new post wouldn't seize. I honed the seat tube with a brake cylinder hone and greased it up real good.
What volume of lye crystals did you mix with your 500mL of water? Also, what was the piece you used to form the lower part of your makeshift splash guard?
You should be able to get lye crystals at your local hardware store. You may need some small rubber plugs to close the vent holes between the BB shell and the down tube. You will also need to clamp some sort of hose on the down tube and something to pour the mixture into.
Ahh, the crystal meth...od.
In all seriousness, these things are the real deal. RJ the Bike Guy had to use an 8 tonne jack because a 2 tonne wasn't enough - as in, it takes the weight of a bus to remove these. A flippin bus.
Any new alloy seatpost should be anodized, installed with some oil,
(like 30w or something) and moved every so often so you don't have to repeat this process.
You could just have used the pvc pipe as your new seat . Great for those long rides , will never have to stop .
Certainly cut down on the bathroom stops.
If only the previous owner(s) of the frame had greased the seat post; prevention is better than cure. I've watched no end of videos on removing stuck seat posts but a lot of them call for specialist equipment that the average person is unlikely to have. Using lye (caustic soda in the UK) is relatively quick and cost effective. Although it won't damage steel it is messy and as shown in the video care should be taken when using it.
Nice video. Now, I know what to do next time with out ruining the paint. Had the same happen on my favorite Specialized Hardrock MTB. Heating the frame with an Oxygen Propane Torch until it was cherry red did the trick but it also cooked the paint off. Now it's ugly and not my favorite anymore. Did not try cutting the seat post but I suppose it might work if a hack saw blade were able to fit inside tube and were able to cut the tube length wise. Thank you for sharing.
How many grams of lye did you end up using?
Are you feeling the entire down tub or is the bottom of the seat post solid. Thank you
OK, read carefully, I clamped the clamp onto a vise and broke the bond so the clamp came out of the post. I put the frame in professional bike work clamp anchor to a wall, braced the rest of the frame so it wouldn't move. Clamped the seat post in a jaw designed specifically for its size, Attach a six foot pole to the clamp and pulled down slowly. The post broke, away from where it was clamped, spiral fracture! Damnedest thing I ever saw!! When I say we tried everything...we tried everything!
how long did you let the post sit with penetrating oil before you tried all that?
Great solution! This will come in handy one day. Have had this problem already three times and so far have gotten them all out except one on my brothers bike. Good to know that I'll be able to move it when it is needed.
Would this work with a carbon frame
And all this for a frame that*s worth like ten bucks lol :D
Max Lindner This is a Bruce Gordon Rock and Road frame. Short of Rivendell but one of the better touring frames made. The worth is debatable, the retail is about $2300 (american? yup!)...and i'll take every BG frame you got for $10 each.
Walter Richardson Ooops. This frame looked like every other old school steel bike frame to me...
Max Lindner No worries, it didn't look like much when we got it. Pulled all the old components, got that pesky seat post out, had it powder coated and rebuilt up with new components and it's a show piece. It is also a very nice riding bike according to my wife who now tours on it.
Walter Richardson Nice job man!
I come from the mountainbiking corner with fat aluminum frames etc. which is why I thought this frame was a dinosaur in the first moment :D
+Max Lindner You haven't lived until youve riden a good steel frame brother. Even a good steel mountainbike.
I'd like to see YOUR video of you sawing out a seat post in five minutes!
post it...or shut up! I say you can't do it...prove me wrong.
welll you cant say he wasnt using protection
Euh... What's with the sandals sister ?😅
thanks..you just gave me another option....great video
Same thing happened to me...
I attacked it with hammer and a flat head screw driver with a full can of WD40 :D
After 2 hours the post was unstuck, undamaged frame and the seat post, but my shoulder was hurting me for about 2 days more...
The damn thing taught me a lesson about greasing the post, which I never did :)
Now, I'm still using the same frame and the seat post...
I don't remember the concentration. I think I mixed as directed for full strength. I'll post again if I find the container but it is stored somewhere. The collar is a step down rubber plumbing joint with hose clamps. 2" to 1.5" I think and the bottom clamp was wound up to crush it it onto the seat tube.
well done...excellent video friends.......but l fear for the original paint of my KHS steel frame if l try this.....l don´t know...can anybody tell me if the steel tube got heated by the reaction and the paint is also fucked up ?....thanks for posting😉👽
Waltor Richardson & Co, -Thanks for the instructional video on the 'Chemical Method',
I too tried everything until I was left with just a stump of a post stuck inside the seat tube... will buy lye and get back to you. I am either going to do this or find a 27.2 reamer, frankly I thing this chem. method is safer on a steel frame since I 'slipped' with the cold-chisel and screwdriver trying to bang out the broken post.
¡¡YEA NICE WORK ready for instalL another ALUMINIUN SEAT post.
just got a great idea by this. get a couple large long drill bits, expensive though, might be around thirty bucks for a few three different sizes. just bigger than the hole of inner part of post. then start your drilling, use one, then next than next. and then BOOM, it'll just crack when its thin enough. instead of taking a chance or worrying if that stuff might ruin your frame. But good job, it worked.
at least 30 bucks for the bits. I have many friends that have tried your method the only ones that were successful used a drill press they had to borrow from a bike frame manufacturer because most other drill presses wont have the clearance for a frame. Lye dissolves aluminium, cannot hurt steel. Drilling or sawing has a far greater potential of damaging a steel frame. Why does everyone insist I did this the hard way and some brute force method would have been so easy?
Walter Richardson I'm running into this problem right now. I'm going to be trying the lye solution outside but I don't have a bike stand. I have a few questions:
1) How did you clog the BB hole up?
2) Did the solution end up damaging any of the paint?
3) Was the plastic fitting an absolute must? What components do you use? I see a worm clamp but I've no idea what else I should get.
bluewker 1. I bought a couple of rubber plugs at a local hardware store but i didn't need them because this frame has no vent between the seat tube and the BB shell (first time I'd ever seen that actually) 2. it generates quite a bit of heat so your paint could bubble, we had already planned to have it powdercoated so we didn't care. 3. the reaction is pretty violent and without the thing on top it would splatter a lot. I used a length of pvc pipe and a rubber step down collar. If you do what I did just go to the hardware store and wander around in the plumbing section until you find something that will work.
i see pinholes
Next time I need to get rid of some dead bodies Ima call you guys. Gangsta!
fantastic video, thank you for posting it, very helpful. Yes, the naysayers and critics in the comments section are quite gratuitous, and unfortunately have become de rigueur in unmoderated forums. Still, thank you. I will attempt this shortly. I don't want to blister my paint, and I hope it doesn't.
SCIENCE !
All this work for a bike I paid $50 for. Guilty myself but I won’t cross the line into dangerous chemicals.
Where did you find a Bruce Gordon Rock n Road 50 bucks? I'll give you 100 for it right now.
January/21/2015
I just remove a stubborn seatpost from my road bike -trek 360 I hammer it/heat it/out wd 40-nothing-and I work on it for hours
finally I went to my garage -turn on my 60 gallon compressor and hook my air hammer-I had it out in about 5 minutes(if u wait for your compressor to fully charge it will tale less time to get it out
if u don't have a compressor-which bike shops don't have
if u have a friend who has one-or u can take to a mechanic shop-let them know what u want-and that then can use their air hammer-hopefully they wont charge u lot.
if I had a vice- I would I would have taking the seatpost in a minute-try people-it WORKS
air hamer? you hammer it deeper into the seat tube? what exactly do you do?
My aluminum bottom bracket drive side cup is seized onto my carbon fiber frame. Getting desperate and hoping I could go chemical but afraid this solution or caustic soda would damage the carbon? Any insight would be greatly appreciated! Thanks
OK, My number one piece of advice is: Don't take mine or anyone else's word for it when an expensive frame is on the line. You can perform experiments to make decisions for you. I would get a carbon fiber spacer for a headset which you can get online and slide the spacer over a piece of aluminum tubing snugger fit the better. Drop that into some lye and see if the carbon fiber is damaged. My guess is this is not the way you want to do this. I believe the carbon fiber would be damaged by the heat. Steel is more resilient but when we did our think there was enough heat to blister. I do know that carbon fiber alone will not react, but the heat of the reaction with the aluminum is I THINK beyond the tolerance of the Carbon fiber. Take your frame to a high end bike shop, I bet they have seen this before. We only did what we did after consulting with 3 different bike mechanics who all told us it was sad but we were going to have to throw a Bruce Gordon frame away.
What if I wrapped my frame up with trash bags will the chemical go through it ?
does this work with a carbon frame?
Lye crystals, a rubber plumbing joint that steps down so the smaller diameter fits on the seat tube and is clamped on with a hose clamp. A short length of pvc pipe to give the solution some room to bubble away. In most frams you will have to plug the vent holes that pass from the seat tube to the bottom bracket shell or your solution will just run out. I got some little rubber plugs at the hardware store but then found there were no vents. The fumes are irritating and explosive so do it outside.
Should I just buy a new Frame?
Also happened to me but in the aluminum frame and the carbon tube. I put wd40 between the tube and the aluminum frame (enough) to let it absorb and then fastening the frame and turning the seat it released. After taking off, I cleaned and re-lubricated both the carbon tube and inside the frame with wd40 and it was perfect. There was no need to cut or break anything.
Can you list all the stuff?? I need to try on my frame also
I envy the us with a proper market where you can just buy shit.
What is the chemical called?
Lye. It's a drain cleaner. In the UK it's sold as caustic soda.
Really why do they make bikes that have ali and steel mixed like this look what a problem it causes i bet numerous people have got so frustrated by it that theyve has no option but to throw a good bike away. Its an absolute nightmare but it s good to see you got a good result and wernt beaten
What was that chemical that you were using? Am i right in thinking that it literally melted the alloy away or something?
+christopher benson Yes, it was Sodium Hydroxide commonly called "lye" it dissolves aluminum with violent reaction. It isn't melting so much as it dissolves the chemical bonds that give aluminum the physical quality of metal. You're left with a slurry of aluminum salts.
The aluminum chemically welds to the bare steel. It's counterintuitive, but you can just put some light grease on the post to prevent that bond from forming between the post and the tube. Also Park and other companies sell anti-seize compounds specifically to keep this from happening, but it's way too late once it's stuck...
oh, a cowboy with experience ;)
in my case it turned up that the seat post was stuck only 2 inches deep, call it luck :)
Video clearly states no BB access to seat tube on this frame.
Anyone got any idea how to get a steel seat post out of a steel frame?,preferably without destroying the frames paint?
thread the seatpost. attach big nut. knock out with slide hammer
Hope it pays off at the end.
How did you guys seal the bottom bracket?
to our surprise there were no weld vents in the BB shell so we didn't have to. I bought a rubber stopper i was going to plug the vent with but I didn't need it. If you want to try this, lye wont react with rubber or plastic so you can plug it.
Breaking bad
Good idea
After watching this video I decided to try and use this technique to remove to aluminum that friction welded to the journal on a crank shaft.
It works....
Thanks for posting, great video.
( but you still remind me of Breaking bad )
I need to do this, what do I need
+unknown you
caustic soda 2 water to 1 soda thats what you need and i used 2 bottles
Get a reamer
This is far safer and cheaper
I can't believe I watched the whole thing.
lol, dressed up better than anyone who ever attempted to mass produce some deadly chemical agent or secret biochemical bacteria, and then goes and wears saddles!!!! Boy 'o Boy, you just gotta laugh - but thank you all the same, it is indeed a very effective method to solve this problem :)
+The_ Pentaquark. Yes someone made the same observation over a year ago. I gotta laugh because the joke is on you! if you had even bothered to read other posts you would see that neoprene sandals are non-reactive to lye, not sure why people want to think Im an idiot but I guess we are now living in a world where facts no longer matter. Why didnt I wear boots or something? read this cut and paste from last year...I await your apology -You are an observant fellow. Since I hope this video is instructional I will give a detailed response to this.The sandals were a deliberate choice! OK, the suit itself is a tyvek coated with PVC impervious to alkaline (Lye) but not heat. The suit is also closed on the bottom (it has feet) so my feet were protected. The sandals are neoprene, again impervious to lye. The sandals just protected the bottom of the suit, and my feet, from the ground. ;Had I worn work boots the lye, if spilt, would have reacted with the leather of the boot creating enough heat to give me second degree burns, enough heat to melt the pvc and compromise the suit. The result is my feet are turned into soap! (thats bad) Even neoprene work boots (which I dont currently own but did when I worked in hazmat) have organic linings resulting in the same catastrophe. So yeah a $5 pair of sandals was the best footwear choice.
my apologies, I thought everyone had a pair of wellington boots lying around somewhere - 100% PVC or Natural Rubber are pretty cheap and easy to come by; Here in the UK it's quite often wet/raining, so not so unusual to have a pair knocking around somewhere.
P.S. Your logic is sound - thanx for taking the time to explain - it just looked a little odd, that's all :)
I agreed, my wife and I had chuckle about the very same thing, at least how it looked, on the day of the work.
Its spelt 'Aluminium'
it's spelled "spelled" (jerk)
@@waltor5849 :)
@@waltor5849 It's true; the American English past tense form is spelled. In other varieties of English, both spelled and spelt are common. ... The past tense of the verb “spell” can be spelt in two ways.
Forgot you were in the colonies.
@@mgriffiths09 ah, you have no idea how difficult it was for me not to pronounce it al-u-min-ee-um
Good god, the joke truly is on me, "Aluminum" is the American variant of the spelling.
All that personal protection equipment and he's wearing flip flops and socks!
I suggest you read some of the other comments about this issue. The flip flops are neoprene and impervious to lye, I am not wearing socks! the PVC coated hazmat suit has feet. A complete discussion of this issue in answer to Jim McDowell two years ago.
Awesome video...