Hi, I am currently building up an Italian framed Harry Hall bike. I have been after a crankset that had enough info to go off that I could easily select a bb/ crank combo. I picked a 600 Arabesque crank. Now from my research I have found that Shimano did a 119mm bb in JIS for italian bottom brackets. So I purchased a new stronglight JIS 119mm italian bb to go with it. When I have mounted the crank arms, I get a chainline of around 47mm, which is obviously too wide. So I'm talking about a 3-4mm difference than what is recommended. The only thing I can thing of is that the crankset is iso, however I cannot find any record of this crank being made in iso. The only record of Shimano using iso cranks is in the first gen dura ace. Also the bolts on either side don't sit central in the crank arms, so I can't install the dust cap/ auto crank puller. Any advice would be appreciated.
Shimano 600 arabesque chainline issue
- Thread starter Peterc123
- Start date
Yes, from what I can see the English bb was 116 and Italian was 119.
No, from what I can see it's 116 and 119 for English and Italian respectively, the bb was 6200 for the Arabesque. I've seen a few groupsets for sale with the 116mm bb. Seems strange. Might be something off with the crankset. As I mentioned the bolt doesn't sit central in the crank. I can't even fit the self extractor as it's so far off from centre. The crank originally came with a self extracting system too.
Midlife
Retro Wizard
You are right 
https://velobase.com/ViewComponent.aspx?ID=af4857bb-c3f8-4016-8a48-a9080ec3d4fb
Must stop relying on 40 year old memory like Jo Biden's lol
https://velobase.com/ViewComponent.aspx?ID=af4857bb-c3f8-4016-8a48-a9080ec3d4fb
Must stop relying on 40 year old memory like Jo Biden's lol
bikeworkshop
Senior Retro Guru
We always go with using the axle length that puts the chainrings roughly in line with the middle of the block.
That's it.
No measuring, no using online data, just using what's there in front of you to get the best chainline.
Job done.
It does help that we have every length available to hand though.
And sometimes the next size up or down has the same length on we've never worked out why. It's not often you need to alter the q factor by pushing out the non- drive side.)
You could measure how much you want to lose on the drive side take it into a bike shop and buy an Italian thread jis square taper with the projection you want... if you can find one!
That's it.
No measuring, no using online data, just using what's there in front of you to get the best chainline.
Job done.
It does help that we have every length available to hand though.
And sometimes the next size up or down has the same length on we've never worked out why. It's not often you need to alter the q factor by pushing out the non- drive side.)
You could measure how much you want to lose on the drive side take it into a bike shop and buy an Italian thread jis square taper with the projection you want... if you can find one!
marshalllucky
Retro Guru
sjcprojects
Orange 🍊 Fan
About the bolts - those are the newer style of bolts that come with modern BBs, which won’t allow room for dust caps. For that you need traditional bolts, not the hex bolt type you have.
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You don't appear to be measuring chainline correctly to me (if I have looked right at the photo) as it should be the centreline between the two chainrings.
However you can easily use a shorter BB and tune things - what's the clearance between crank ends and the chainstays? Also chainring clearance?
However you can easily use a shorter BB and tune things - what's the clearance between crank ends and the chainstays? Also chainring clearance?
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