Mavic Cranks and BB's

[Old Ned]

I'm hoping that someone here can assist me with a minor query. I have a pair of early Mavic Pista cranks (similar design to Campag Record etc.) which I want to fit to my Carlton Flyer track bike. I'm currently running an early 90's Shimano 105 road crank with the single ring fitted to the inside position and a Tange Cassette BB of 107mm length (which I'm assuming is identical to the Shimano one of the same length and is JIS taper) and with a thin spacer on the drive side of the BB (to allow fitting a larger chainring and clearing the chainstay) the chain line is very good. However, the 'Q' factor is quite wide which I would like to overcome. I tried fitting the Mavic crank yesterday as I prefer the 'classic' look of the design (and its potential narrower 'Q' factor) but it will not fit far enough up the taper and the chainline is way out. As Mavic is French I'm also assuming (I do a lot of this) that it should be an ISO taper that is required but would this still be a 107 axle or can anyone recommend a suitable BB that will work and give me what I want?

 

[fiks]

I once fitted the earlier Mavic road cranks (Nuovo Record type) to a Nuovo Record bottom bracket. The fit of the taper was similar to NR cranks on a NR bb, it certainly wasn't like old Campag cranks on a modern Shimano bb, where the cranks only goes on about half way.

I would think the Nuovo Record track BB (109mm axle) would be a good alternative if you don't have the original bb. Just off the top of my head, I think the modern Campag track BB is 110mm, but I'm not sure whether the taper's been changed or not.

 

[Cheesedisease]

I would think the Nuovo Record track BB (109mm axle) would be a good alternative if you don't have the original bb. Just off the top of my head, I think the modern Campag track BB is 110mm, but I'm not sure whether the taper's been changed or not.

Campagnolo taper hasn't changed, I've had vintage Campag Pista cranks on current sealed Campag Pista bb and on older loose ball bearing bb. As for the Mavic Pista crank, my LBS had the lovely fluted Mavic crankset on a Campag BB a while back no problem and good chainline.

As you say the difference is only that the bb length has changed. Modern ones are 111mm, whereas the vintage Pista cranks were 109mm. I had a 1980s Pista crank on the 111mm bb and the chain line is very good, but not quite perfect.

The perfect 109mm axles can be hard to come by, especially Pista ones, get expensive. I managed to get a NOS Victory bb for a double setup a lot cheaper, and these are also 109mm in length. I think people also tend to just measure the Victory one as 109mm and then sell it as a Pista BB! You can tell it's not as it doesn't have the 'P' or 'SP' in the code on the axle I don't think.

Hope that info helps in some way.