Bike shop told me to use thread lock on pedals

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Soltydog

Legendary Member
Location
near Hornsea
I wouldn't have thought so. They'll be a right sod to get off, should you ever need to.
AFAIK the threads are designed so they wont come loose whilst pedalling
 
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Alembicbassman

Alembicbassman

Confused.com
That's what I thought, they got a bit clicky after dry storage over winter, so just whipped 'em off and put some dry lube on the threads instead. If that doesn't work I'll try some Moly grease. I'll use the thread lock on my SKS stays instead.
 

Broadside

Guru
Location
Fleet, Hants
Don't put threadlock on - use some type of grease instead to stop the threads from sticking, exactly the opposite of threadlock!

I put my pedals on handtight with a liberal dose of grease and they never come loose. I remove them once a year to re-grease and have to use a spanner to get them off as they have always tightened up significantly. As Soltydog says the threads are designed so that the pedals tighten on to the crank to prevent them from working loose.
 
Location
Midlands
No - they are difficult to get off at the best of times - I always lightly grease mine and then gently tighten - check after a week that they are tight
 

Svendo

Guru
Location
Walsden
I know it seems counter intuitive, but doesn't threadlock prevent threads tightening as well as loosening, being basically glue? So your pedal's threads will stay where they are once the thread lock sets until you break the 'lock' with a spanner.
Having said that I use grease on mine as they tighten up themselves like other's above.
 
Bit of grease for me too, and a gentle nip up.
A threadlock should be sort of a gel once the thread is tightened, but there are different strengths of hold. I use the stuff at work but it only goes on screws that are generally subject to vibration or on high speed rotational objects. Don't really want a bolt coming off when rotating at 5000rpm. I doubt your cadence is anywhere near that.
 
Location
Midlands
Piemaster said:
Bit of grease for me too, and a gentle nip up.
A threadlock should be sort of a gel once the thread is tightened, but there are different strengths of hold. I use the stuff at work but it only goes on screws that are generally subject to vibration or on high speed rotational objects. Don't really want a bolt coming off when rotating at 5000rpm. I doubt your cadence is anywhere near that.

and as someone very rightly pointed out the threads are such that unless you permantly backpedal or fide a fixie backwards it is highly unlikely that they will come off

notwithstanding that if they are not nipped up properly they can make a mess of the threads in a relatively soft aluminium crank if there is a little movement

After having struggled and bent a chromoloy spanner trying to loosen my pedals for a flight from Malaga I regularly take the pedals off and regrease them before they get to that state
 

Smokin Joe

Legendary Member
Svendo said:
I know it seems counter intuitive, but doesn't threadlock prevent threads tightening as well as loosening, being basically glue? .
Threads don't tighten in use.
 

guitarpete247

Just about surviving
Location
Leicestershire
Pedals are made with opposite threads so they tighten themselves as you pedal. Putting thread lock on will only make it almost impossible to remove them. I changed the pedals, last week, on my Saracen which is 22 years old and had the original pedals on. They came off with very little effort as they had been greased when they had been put on. I'd hate to think how long it would have taken me let alone graized knuckles if they had had thread lock on them.
 
Add the bike shop to the list of places NOT to go for servicing/advice.

Grease is applied to negate the effects of cro-moly steel sticking in aluminium and does a fine job of it. It doesn't "loosen" anything

Threadlock has little or no place in the cycle workshop
 

02GF74

Über Member
Smokin Joe said:
Threads don't tighten in use.


hmm, for a bolt that holds two piece of stuff together doesn't, in fact it does the opposite but the pedal spindle is subject to forces, albeit small, that tend (I think) to tighten it.

I alsway grease the thread and have never had problem with them unscrewing.

As an aside, we know about entropy (don't we?) where every thing tends to go to the state of most chaos. A good example is that I have a bolt and a couple of nuts in my toolkit. To save some space, I put the nut onto the bolt and after some time, the nut always tends to undo - which is totally wierd as you would expect it to move either way hence more or less stay put.
 

zacklaws

Guru
Location
Beverley
In one of my earlier jobs we used threadlock frequently to fasten bolts which may have had a tendency to work free due to vibration and was no major issue to free up and most times its use was unnoticeable. But it does come in different strengths, so the stronger ones may need more torque to release.

At the moment I use it on one of my road bikes to secure the water bottle holders into the frame as they have a tendency to vibrate loose and once again it is no big issue to remove the bolts.

As for using it on pedals, I can see no reason why you should have to, pedals fasten down tight and should not work free unless the threads are worn or damaged badly in the crank or the pedal itself, in which case threadlocker would be of no use and the only answer would be to replace the parts. A simple coating of copper grease will suffice to ensure its easy to untighten.
 
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