Does anyone know of a crankset and bb that would fit a 2003 KHS Sport hardtail?

The rings on my bicycle are cracked. And I noticed that they are connected to the crank on the drive side. So I think I need to get a new crankset and a bottom bracket. I've been thinking that I rarely even use the front derailleur, so I might just take it off and have just one ring. Will the rear derailleur be affected?

Post in the Drivetrain section of MTBR.com.

It's most likely not necessary to go to that sort of expense. On virtually all mountain bikes, the crank unit is actually made up of a number of pieces, each of which can be individually removed and replaced:


[left arm] -- [bottom bracket] -- [right arm] [ring] [ring] [ring]

If your rings are dead, you can just replace the rings, keeping your existing crankarms and bottom bracket. There are 2 or 3 different bolting standards for mountain bike chainrings, any store will make sure you get the right ones. Quite often the dimensions will be written right on the chainring somewhere.

If you want to go and upgrade your crank and BB anyway, you'll find heaps that will fit fine -- the bottom bracket shells are standardised. I had a KHS hardtail frame kicking about some time, it used a 68mm English thread bottom bracket (the same as about 98% of all the other MTB and road bikes out there nowadays)

If you rarely use the front gears, it's still handy to keep the front derailleur on there as a chain retention device of sorts. When you put the chain under load, the chain will jump around a bit and this (along with some other external force, like a bumpy road or changing the rear gears) can cause it to bump off the front ring. If you don't have something there to keep the chain on the chainring, you'll be in a spot of bother

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Peter
Cannondale Synapse Carbon Scalpel Cyclocross Ultra

I think I know what the problem is, the crankset currently on my bicycle seems to be a road crankset. I think it's a Shimano Nexave. I remember I got it off a hybrid bicycle my friend upgraded. Could that explain why the chainrings aren't removable?

Yeah, would do. Nexave is one of Shimano's "comfort/city bike" groupsets and these tend to be a little weird in terms of maintenance and what you can/cannot pull apart, interoperate with, etc.

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Peter
Cannondale Synapse Carbon Scalpel Cyclocross Ultra