Specialized Epic bottom bracket fit problems

A specialized epic mountain bike in red

The Epic in bits – now to put it back together

You might have read last week that I was having some bottom bracket traumas with my Specialized Epic. Well, incase anyone else has the same problems as me, here’s what I came up with.

I’ve got XTR cranks on my bike and it turns out that because of the way Shimano have splined them they only fit an XTR bottom bracket (money making proprietary formats anyone?). Now the XTR brackets that fit my bike only come in 112mm and 116mm lengths, both of which are too short! Figure that one out anyone…

My local bike shop are really helpful though and they’re currently trying to see if they can fit enough spacers to bring the smallest chainring out. If not, the alternative apparently is a road bike bottom bracket which will apparently fit fine and comes in wider measurements!

Anyway, the mechanic said that Epics are known for this problem. How true that is I don’t know since I know two friends with Epics that work fine!

Sorry for a pretty boring post but if it helps anyone else figure out the ubiquitous Specialized Epic short bottom bracket problem then it’s worth it! Comments welcome from anyone else that’s had the same thing!

Colin

Colin started mountain biking in the early 2000s and has haphazardly, and with barely increasing skill, dragged his bike around the majority of Scotland's trail centres since then. Colin has oodles of hard earned experience in how NOT to do things - listen, be warned and don't repeat his mistakes...   More about Colin... Google+ Colin

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