I will try to keep this concise, but essentially I am wanting to try out a shorter crank. I am ~170cm tall and have recently learned the defacto 170+ cranks are not ideal for shorter people, and may not be ideal for average or even tall people for that matter. I have been dealing with some lower back and knee pain for many years, and Im hoping that dropping down to 160mm will help.
My road bike is ~15 years old but everything on it is in excellent condition and well kept. Its equipped with a Sora 3400 3×9 groupset, a “Prowheel” 172.5mm crank, on ye olde square taper bottom bracket (68mm english), 135mm rear hub/dropout, and rim brakes. I mostly use it for gravel riding and dont have many hills to deal with. Its also worth noting that Im just doing this for leisure and Im not very fast.
I see there are some newer shimano cranks (105) available in 160mm, but the 9 speed stuff is 165+, and I mostly only see 170 available online. This quickly leads me into scope creep on this project. With how old most of the parts are on my bike, I would likely have to do a whole new groupset and its too expensive to justify. I especially dont want to have to deal with changing the rear hub because I just recently had a new set of quality wheels built for gravel and that was not cheap.
This leads me into the fabulous and confusing world of boutique parts. I have managed to find a few 160mm cranks available for sale, but they all seem to be for MTB or BMX. Many have high q factor, high chainline offset for wide wheel setups, and use the larger 30mm crank spindles. I am okay with upgrading my old bottom bracket to a new hollowtech or whatever, but Im not sure what I can run that will still work with my rear cassette and its position. Im also okay with ditching the 3x and going to a 2x or even 1x if that lets me hack something together. As noted before, Im mostly doing flat terrain gravel so I dont think 1×9 would be that limiting for me.
I feel like Im looking for the holy grail. A 160mm crankset with 45mm chainline, low q-factor (~150mm), fits a 68mm BSA shell, and doesnt cost a small fortune.
I really appreciate any advice you can offer me. Thank you!
walton_jonez on
Check out senicx pr2 or pr3 cranks on aliexpress
Edit: nevermind. They only go to 165 as well
There are other options for 160 cranks on aliexpress though. They are mostly labeled as children’s bike cranks but they have the characteristics of road cranks
Treptay on
As the other comment said, senicx cranks offer 165mm at the lowest end. (also they offer subcompact chainrings, can only recommend them.
For the cheapest 160mm cranks, the cheapest I saw were shimano 105 cranks, but they are usually sold out, and are not THAT cheap.
Antti5 on
Considering that you’re currently with 172.5 mm cranks, I would consider going down to 165 mm. I’m also a 170 cm rider, so I know that the crank length formulas tend to recommend either 160 mm or 165 mm cranks.
165 mm cranks have been commonly available for much longer, so it should open many options. 160 mm has really become widely available quite recently.
GlitzyChomsky on
Croder make a [modular crankset called Spirit ](https://www.crodercycling.com/products/spirit-modular-crankset)which has a crank length that ranges from 140mm up to 172.5mm. I have the 160mm version on my bike. I’m about your height and last year I went and had a professional bike fit for the first time. During the session we dropped the cranklength from 167.5mm down to 160mm and it dramatically improved my comfort and endurance on the bike.
Because it is modular you’ll have to purchase all the components – arms, axle, spider and chainrings. I have the arms and axle mounted to my Quarq DZero power meter, with Sram Red 50-34 110BCD chain rings.
I must also note, the Q-factor of these Croder cranks is noticably wider than more generic / standard cranks, like an extra 5mm each side. So you’ll need to adjust your cleats accordingly otherwise your knees will not forgive you.
There are also the new Sram Red E1 Dub crank arms you can purchase on their own, available in a 160mm version. Although the axle is their propiatory Dub version, so you’ll need a new bottom bracket, and it’ll cost you a small fortune.
Edit: The Croder axle is standard 24mm.
RomeoSierraSix on
SRAM Apex goes down to 160 for less than 100 bucks
6 Comments
Greetings and salutations, bikewrench-ers!
I will try to keep this concise, but essentially I am wanting to try out a shorter crank. I am ~170cm tall and have recently learned the defacto 170+ cranks are not ideal for shorter people, and may not be ideal for average or even tall people for that matter. I have been dealing with some lower back and knee pain for many years, and Im hoping that dropping down to 160mm will help.
My road bike is ~15 years old but everything on it is in excellent condition and well kept. Its equipped with a Sora 3400 3×9 groupset, a “Prowheel” 172.5mm crank, on ye olde square taper bottom bracket (68mm english), 135mm rear hub/dropout, and rim brakes. I mostly use it for gravel riding and dont have many hills to deal with. Its also worth noting that Im just doing this for leisure and Im not very fast.
I see there are some newer shimano cranks (105) available in 160mm, but the 9 speed stuff is 165+, and I mostly only see 170 available online. This quickly leads me into scope creep on this project. With how old most of the parts are on my bike, I would likely have to do a whole new groupset and its too expensive to justify. I especially dont want to have to deal with changing the rear hub because I just recently had a new set of quality wheels built for gravel and that was not cheap.
This leads me into the fabulous and confusing world of boutique parts. I have managed to find a few 160mm cranks available for sale, but they all seem to be for MTB or BMX. Many have high q factor, high chainline offset for wide wheel setups, and use the larger 30mm crank spindles. I am okay with upgrading my old bottom bracket to a new hollowtech or whatever, but Im not sure what I can run that will still work with my rear cassette and its position. Im also okay with ditching the 3x and going to a 2x or even 1x if that lets me hack something together. As noted before, Im mostly doing flat terrain gravel so I dont think 1×9 would be that limiting for me.
I feel like Im looking for the holy grail. A 160mm crankset with 45mm chainline, low q-factor (~150mm), fits a 68mm BSA shell, and doesnt cost a small fortune.
I really appreciate any advice you can offer me. Thank you!
Check out senicx pr2 or pr3 cranks on aliexpress
Edit: nevermind. They only go to 165 as well
There are other options for 160 cranks on aliexpress though. They are mostly labeled as children’s bike cranks but they have the characteristics of road cranks
As the other comment said, senicx cranks offer 165mm at the lowest end. (also they offer subcompact chainrings, can only recommend them.
For the cheapest 160mm cranks, the cheapest I saw were shimano 105 cranks, but they are usually sold out, and are not THAT cheap.
Considering that you’re currently with 172.5 mm cranks, I would consider going down to 165 mm. I’m also a 170 cm rider, so I know that the crank length formulas tend to recommend either 160 mm or 165 mm cranks.
165 mm cranks have been commonly available for much longer, so it should open many options. 160 mm has really become widely available quite recently.
Croder make a [modular crankset called Spirit ](https://www.crodercycling.com/products/spirit-modular-crankset)which has a crank length that ranges from 140mm up to 172.5mm. I have the 160mm version on my bike. I’m about your height and last year I went and had a professional bike fit for the first time. During the session we dropped the cranklength from 167.5mm down to 160mm and it dramatically improved my comfort and endurance on the bike.
Because it is modular you’ll have to purchase all the components – arms, axle, spider and chainrings. I have the arms and axle mounted to my Quarq DZero power meter, with Sram Red 50-34 110BCD chain rings.
I must also note, the Q-factor of these Croder cranks is noticably wider than more generic / standard cranks, like an extra 5mm each side. So you’ll need to adjust your cleats accordingly otherwise your knees will not forgive you.
There are also the new Sram Red E1 Dub crank arms you can purchase on their own, available in a 160mm version. Although the axle is their propiatory Dub version, so you’ll need a new bottom bracket, and it’ll cost you a small fortune.
Edit: The Croder axle is standard 24mm.
SRAM Apex goes down to 160 for less than 100 bucks