I need to get the pedals off my bike, but the right pedal won’t budge. They are 105 pedals and only have the hex bolt, which is rounded. 3 bike shops haven’t been able to help. Any ideas other than using an allen key, hex bolt is definitely done and dusted. I have a 12mm cobalt drill bit I could use? No idea if that’s going to work on hardened steel? I don’t mind if pedal is trashed. Just need to get it off? (yes I am turning the allen key the right way). Thanks
You rounded the 8mm bolt? God help us all. You could try to shave off a flat section on the outer side to create a surface for a vise.
My dad used to work on cars a lot and he would always use a bit of heat on stuck bolts but you have to be super careful depending on what your crank material is.
If you want bring it around home and we can have a play, I have most tools?! Or some spare cranks you can borrow…
I currently have a pedal seized into my commuting bike. I have tried pretty much everything and came to conclusion the best solution was to give up and replace the cranks when the pedals need to be replaced. The time and effort cost of drilling, re-tapping, etc was going to be higher than new cranks.
In my case I think road salt/debris from last winter worked its way into the threads and has bonded the interface. Even if I got the pedals removed I suspect the crank threads would be trashed and wouldn’t be confident in just putting in new pedals. Sucks but you can get a lot of torque on the hex bolts such that when they are rounded it means something is well and truly seized.
Break off the pedal body and use a pipe wrench to grab the spindle.
Been there, done that. Hopefully the threads aren’t galled 
large torx key. (right on the verge of fitting) Hammer it in. The heat idea is a good one, as is putting the anti-seize to it and letting it sit.
Jaretj’s advice will also work
*never tried it but you could also dremel two flat spots on the pedal axle, grab it with a wrench and turn it.
Remove crank from bikeRemove pedal body from axleClamp pedal axle in a bench viceTwist that sucker off
Maybe you can save the pedal, but I would just ditch it and start over. And seriously, for the effort involved, I would just ditch everything and replace the crankset and pedals.
My dad used to work on cars a lot and he would always use a bit of heat on stuck bolts but you have to be super careful depending on what your crank material is.
If you want bring it around home and we can have a play, I have most tools?! Or some spare cranks you can borrow…
Might be able use a crockpot of oil to heat it more gently than using a torch. Heating and then cooling MIGHT break some of the threads loose depending on how different the coefficients of thermal expansion are.
large torx key. (right on the verge of fitting) Hammer it in. The heat idea is a good one, as is putting the anti-seize to it and letting it sit.
If you’re going this way, several applications of PB blaster or other penetrating spray will be critcal. Also look into an impact screwdriver. I’d probably remove the crank from the bike and put it in a vice if you’re going down the impact driver route.
Also might try the impact driver along with an extractor
https://www.amazon.com/Irwin-Tools-53227-Multi-Spline-Extractor/dp/B0002SRG66/
Plenty of ‘plus gas’ anti seize penetrating oil left on for a night or two.
Ten similar to what some others say - I’d get the pedal body off (with butchery if needed) and get the pedal spindle in a steel vice.
Maybe grind a couple of flats on it too on opposite sides so to get a really good grip.
(Using heat usually relies on either the ‘female’ part warming more than the male so the female expands more, or the female part having a higher coefficient of expansion (which should be the case is Alu cranks and a steel pedal spindle.
If carbon cranks with an insert I’d not try heat for fear of wrecking the crank.
I need to get the pedals off my bike, but the right pedal won’t budge. They are 105 pedals and only have the hex bolt, which is rounded. 3 bike shops haven’t been able to help. Any ideas other than using an allen key, hex bolt is definitely done and dusted. I have a 12mm cobalt drill bit I could use? No idea if that’s going to work on hardened steel? I don’t mind if pedal is trashed. Just need to get it off? (yes I am turning the allen key the right way). Thanks
The spindle is a hardened chromoly steel. You are not going to get a drill bit into that in any way that helps. You could use a diamond grinder burr and (very slowly) grind away the interior of the spindle until you can peel out the threads but if you have electrolytic corrosion going on in there then the cranks will not be salvageable.
Aluminum has a high coefficient of thermal expansion relative to steel. So take the cranks off the bike and put the right side in the freezer. Then, boil a large pot of water and go straight from the freezer to the boiling water. While the assembly is boiling-water hot, put it in a vise and see if you can do as others suggested to use a Torx bit as a screw extractor, or clamp the spindle in the vise and try to spin the crank arm off it. You will need a large vise and solid mounting on a workbench to apply enough clamping pressure.
Lots of good ideas already posted on how to get the pedal off. Penetrating oil, heat, clamp the pedal spindle in a vice and twist it off… In the end you will certainly destroy the pedal and almost certainly destroy the crank arm. My $0.02 worth, unless you’re just looking for some fun garage time destroying stuff, is to just replace the cranks and pedals and start over and save yourself the time and heartache.
Edit: this is exactly why I use Phil Wood waterproof grease on nearly every fastener on my bikes. You could also use anti-sieze (make sure you select the right one) but that stuff is evil. Once a bottle of anti-sieze is opened in a garage it’s like ebola - it’ll be all over everything eventually.
Don’t do what this customer did and cut his PT pedals off a DA crank.
Weld a spanner to the axle like this customer.
First off, so you know who is posting, I manage a large machine shop and work as an engineer, although my degree is in Mathematics. We work with steels in the 40’s and 50’s for Rockwell, as well as 300, 400, and 600 stainless steels and oxy applied Stelite.
From reading the thread you are working with an aluminum crank, right side. The pedal axel is made from chromoly steel (probably hardened AISI 4130). I would need to be there to tell for sure, but you have one of 2 (or maybe both) conditions preventing pedal removal.
The flat is rounded off and you can’t get a grip on the shaft, or the pedal has fused to the crank. Forcing that pedal to turn using any of the several suggestions in this thread will probably remove the pedal. The problem is you will be able to put far more force on that pedal shaft than it was designed to take. Since the shaft is a lot harder than the crank, if something fails it will be the threads in the crank.
Here is what I would do. Remove the crank and take it to a speed shop. They aren’t as plentiful as they were when I was a young kid building cars, but they are still around. Ask them to drill out the axel from the back side. Chromoly steel is not hard to drill, but you have to know what you are doing. We could do it in our shop in about 30 minutes or less.
All they are going to do is put it in a vice and Bridgeport type vertical mill, pick up the center of the axel, use a spot drill to set the start, and then use a cobalt HSS Drill, lots of coolant, and a very slow feed/speed and drill until the minor diameter starts to show the major diameter of the crank. After that you just turn it out and clean the crank threads.
It sounds complicated but it isn’t to a machinist and all that stuff is basic machine shop/speed shop hardware.
However, keep this in mind - the speed shop may want to charge you more to do the removal than the cost of a new crank set. I would ask for a firm price before letting them do it. It may be more cost effective to just take the chance with cranking it out and if the threads are damaged replace the crank set.
Trying to play this out in my head isn’t working. Is the right side standard threaded or reverse? If it’s standard, I’d just drill a pilot hole with a bit designed for drilling metal and then run in with a tap/extractor. If the issue is just that the hex spindle is rounded off and the threads aren’t galled/seized, this should be a 10 minute job (if you have the tools, otherwise it’s a bit longer with the need to go to the hardware store and pick them up).
Trying to play this out in my head isn’t working. Is the right side standard threaded or reverse? If it’s standard, I’d just drill a pilot hole with a bit designed for drilling metal and then run in with a tap/extractor. If the issue is just that the hex spindle is rounded off and the threads aren’t galled/seized, this should be a 10 minute job (if you have the tools, otherwise it’s a bit longer with the need to go to the hardware store and pick them up).
The problem with this situation, in my mind, is how the 8mm hex got rounded off. Assuming that the OP was turning in the correct directiom, if they were able to apply enough force to round off a hex that large and the pedal didn’t budge, then the pedal threads are almost certainy fused to the crank threads. This makes it exceedingly unlikely that the pedal can be removed without destroying the threads in the crank arm. So, even if you could remove the pedal using any of the above-mentioned methods you’re still left with a crank arm with buggered-up threads. Sure, you could helicoil it, or something similar, but again…is all of that worth it? Unless is some super-expensive or impossible to find crank, I’d just pitch it and start over.
Only takes one quick application of torque to break the threads free. Get a tap set, place crank arm at 6:00, attach wrench to tap and hit with a mallet. If it works, great. If not, move onto next potential solution. Heat cycling is definitely a good option depending on materials.
I don’t manage a machine shop, but I do have degrees in physics and engineering. The spindle is steel, but we don’t know for sure what the crank material is. If it’s aluminum, then heat is your friend. Unlike a stuck stem or seatpost, the higher thermal expansion coefficient of aluminum will be in your favor. Spray with a penetrating lubricant (Kroil is a good one), then heat the cranks with a heat gun (even a hair drier will do). The expanding crank arm will allow the lubricant to penetrate. Use something like visegrips to remove the pedal while everything is still hot.
I don’t manage a machine shop, but I do have degrees in physics and engineering. The spindle is steel, but we don’t know for sure what the crank material is. If it’s aluminum, then heat is your friend. Unlike a stuck stem or seatpost, the higher thermal expansion coefficient of aluminum will be in your favor. Spray with a penetrating lubricant (Kroil is a good one), then heat the cranks with a heat gun (even a hair drier will do). The expanding crank arm will allow the lubricant to penetrate. Use something like visegrips to remove the pedal while everything is still hot.
From personal experience, a hair dryer definitely works… it just takes longer to heat up the crankset. If the pedal doesn’t thread out after heating the crank set (assuming Al) and applying a lubricant… there’s a good chance the threads are toast and a new crank (or at least arm) is in order.