Seatpost
My Bianchi Vigorelli was my first proper road bike. When I bought it, Steve at Elite Racing Cycles fitted it up for me and, being new to cycling, I didn’t like to change any of the settings. I now know a bit of trial and error doesn’t go astray and that my preference is for a higher saddle position. In any case, I spenta couple of years riding around on the Vig in the sun and in the rain and then put her into storage while I lived in Japan for a couple of years. When I got back and rode it again, I found I was now used to a higher seat position but when I tried to adjust the height, it turned out the seatpost refused to move. It probably didn’t help that my last ride before leaving for Japan was quite a wet one.
I spent the next couple of months spraying the post with WD-40 but it still refused to budge. Eventually, a few weeks ago, after one or two pinot noirs at the bike shop, we put the thing in a vice and twisted it and belted it and destroyed the post but it still refused to move inside the frame. The only thing left to do was to go the hardware shop, buy a hacksaw blade and cut the thing out.
First the saddle had to come off.
and work begin on the post.
An incision here...
...another one there.
The post refused to fold in on itself so I ended up having to wedge a screwdriver in there and twist and wedge and twist and wedge, slowly peeling the aluminium post off the steel frame. It sort of became my after-work hobby for a couple of weeks. Eventually I got my hands on a great big screwdriver and used a shifting spanner as a substitute hammer, which speeded the process up nicely. It took a while, but I got the bugger out.
All that's left of the old seatpost.
The Vigorelli looking much happier with a new post.
The moral of the story is: grease up your setapost (unless it’s carbon, in which case, don’t grease up your seatpost) and every so often give it a little adjustment to make sure it still moves. Or was the moral to just maintain your bike a bit? Well, something like that, anyway.
Posted on December 10, 2011, in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink. 4 Comments.
Elite Racing Cycles
I have to try to change seatpost higher up my former Kuota frame like yours.But it’s too hard.Thank you for teaching me what can I do.
Hello Kon-san! I hope your Kuota’s seatpost is not also stuck. It’s a horrible job to get them out. How is your winter training going?
That is quite the mangle job you did on that. I would have been far more impressed had you done this without the aid of tools. I am sure had you taken the time to grow your finger nails you could have priced them between the fused metals and worked them loose. You may have avoided having to completely destroy it that way too. Just saying.
I did my best to take it out with only the meagre tools I have. Even with my massive arm power, aluminium turns out to be stronger than you would imagine. I shall have to focus energy on building up fingernail strength.