Pedalite Flashing Pedals

[rfuilrez]

I was wondering if anyone has any experience using the Pedalite Flashing Pedals (Amazon Link Here).

I've had some bad luck with these Pedals and I wanted to share them with you to maybe get some insight as to what's going on.

I purchased a set back in middle of March of this year. I rode my bike to work, and installed them in the shop (not a bike shop, a heavy industrial shop). I thought I did it pretty good, and took my bike home at the end of my day. Before I was about 2.5 miles into my 3.5 mile ride home when I felt the right pedal was no longer flat. I immediately got of the bike, and look at it. The pedal had pulled the threads out of the crank and was wobbling in the whole.

Pedalite replaced the pedals, and I purchased a new bike instead of just replacing the crank. Again I rode the bike to work, and installed the pedals. This time being super careful that the threads were in good shape, I even opted to use Loctite #243 instead of grease this time to ensure that pedals would stay in place. After putting about 5 miles on them, the exact same thing happened, to the right side pedal again.

Again Pedalite replaced the pedals, and this time bought me a new crank. The old 2 cranks were steel cranks, off cheapo Walmart Mountain bikes. I opted to get lower end Shimano (Amazon Link) crank. I took it to a bike shop this time, and had the crank and pedals installed. After putting about 12 miles on them, the left hand pedal pulled the threads out of the crank.

Now, I'm a slightly larger guy (5'11", 230lbs) but the stock pedals never gave me any problems. I do believe there is something not right about the pedals, but I just want to rule out anything. My bike has 29" wheels, and a 28/38/48 crank, that I almost always ride in the top gear, and smallest gear on the cassette. Could I be putting too much force on these pedals? I'm so disappointed as I haven't really gotten a lot of ride time in so far this year because of this.


TL;DR - Bought a pair of pedals, stripped 3 sets with <=12 miles of riding per set. Is it me?

[xerxes]

As long as you're fitting them correctly, and pedals are pretty straight forward, it's hard to see what you could do wrong.

I think after 3 failures, I would give up on them. You can buy decent pedals for a lot less, I have a pair of Wellgo M-20 on both my MTBs and they've never given me any trouble: http://www.wellgo.com.tw/product.asp?category=mtb&offset=10. The pedals on my "shopping bike" are also Wellgo, cheap, one piece plastic things, and they've been totally fine as well.

I would ask for a refund, put the original pedals back on and get a decent set of lights and some 3M retro reflective tape - you'll probably have a fair bit of money left over.

[DaveM]

http://bikinginheels-cycler.blogspot.com/2011/10/perplexing-pedal-problems.html

It sounds to me like there is something wrong with the manufacture or QC of the mounting threads on these pedals. For them to pull out crank threads repeatedly on steel crank arms they have to be pretty badly cut. I would avoid these pedal unfortunately (the lights are a good idea, ruined by poor quality)

[rfuilrez]

So I took my pedals into work today. A pair of non-ruined ones. We did a little looking over and I believe the cause of the problem is a lack of shoulder at the point where the pedals meet the crank arm.

The threads are about 14.1 - 14.2mm in diameter, and the flats are just shy of 14mm. So at the 2 points where the flats are there is 0 shoulder support. The shoulder diameter is 15.95mm. Giving just under 1mm per side of shoulder support. I strongly believe this is the reason I was having problems with the pedals pulling the threads out. Having no support on something that is entirely perpendicularly loaded is terrible.

Image 1 Showing the before.

We took a washer, 23.5mm in diameter and drilled the hole to be a super snug fit over the threads, but still go on. Then I brazed it to the shoulder, and turned it in the lathe to true it up

Image 2 and Image 3.

We also drilled and tapped a M6 hole in the end of the spindle, and I will be putting a bolt and washer on the back side of the pedal after it is installed.

Image 4 and Image 5

And the After

I would like to use these pedals as more than half of my riding comes at night. My crank is already damaged, and Pedalite is going to reimburse me for the pedals AND crank. I'm going to go to a bike shop and have them run a tap through both sides and give this a go. I figured I have nothing to lose at this point. If it works sweet, if not I wasted about 1hour of my time.

I'll keep you guys updated on how it goes for me. Probably overkill lol.

[xerxes]

Nice work!

However, are there any flats on which to use a pedal spanner when you want to install or remove them?

Looking at this picture of some Shimano pedals, it looks like you may be on to something with the lack of shoulder:

[rfuilrez]

Haha. No there aren't any flats. They got covered by the brazing. I have a pair of channel locks that will fit between the pedal, and the washer that I'll be using for a test fit. If they make it even to 50 miles I'll probably uninstall them and mill a pair of flats on them.

Though, if they end up working they're probably going to end up being permanently installed. If they don't work, it means they'll end up damaging the crank again and at that point I will probably just buy a new crank, and a different pair of pedals. I have been thinking of going clipless.

[xerxes]

I don't think you'd need to mill the flats back on; I would just use a hand file and remove some of the excess brass and reveal the original flats.

[rfuilrez]

But using the mill is more fun! And maybe I can make it a proper 15mm set of flats.

[xerxes]

(05-22-2012, 04:15 AM)rfuilrez Wrote:  But using the mill is more fun!

Fair enough.

[rfuilrez]

So I purchased a set of pedal taps, and re-tapped the holes in my cranks. The threads looked like they were still in workable condition and after installing my modified pedals they tightened up and felt like they were going to hold. I installed my keeper bolt and washer set on the back side, and away I went

Well, I didn't even get a mile before they started to wobble in the crank. As I was on an important errand before I went to work I decided to press on. Needless to say after my 4 mile ride this morning the crank hole on the left pedal no longer has even the slightest bit of thread left on it.

I think it may have worked had the threads in the crank been completely fresh, or if I had a threaded insert put in. And if the threads on the pedal were completely fresh as well. They might have gotten boogered up during my installation of the washer to braze it on.

I also suspect the brazing process might have taken any heat treat out of the pedals that might have been in there to begin with.

I have since ordered a new crank, a set of clipless pedals, and a pair of shoes. I offered to send the pedals to the person in the blog posted by Dave. Apparently she really likes they pedals and is only having issues with the internals not lasting.