willtsmith_nwi said:
;-) Well, then it woulld be nice if the other guys settled on Octalink (provided it isn't patented). I just would like to see everyone settle on a standard so Shimano Bottom Brackets will match up with 3rd party cranks and vice-versa.
Actually that was never an issue. See shimano patented the octalink splines yes, and refused to allow aftermarket BBs to be produced by other vendors using that spline, but they quite liberally licensed the patent to other crank makers. Also they did allow OEM only licensing of the BB (FSA made a octalink BB for selected brands that needed a special length spindle shimano was unwilling to produce). Adventure Components, Truvativ, FSA, Coda, Profile Designs, and many others have offered Octalink compatible splined cranks. I have a pair of the Adventure Components LoPro cranks on my Giant presently, with an XTR M950 BB.
But companies like Raceface couldn't compete in quality terms with shimano's hollowcore cranks, and since they lacked a decent R&D budget to come up with AMAZING products, they instead collaborated with truvativ and chris king to develop a goofy new standard for splines that would allow aftermarket BB sales (something raceface had a vested interest in, as it was one of their few products at the time), which has produced ISIS, a generally mediocure product idea. Mediocure because they never bothered to think that maybe there was a reason shimano was only slowly tricking down Octalink to its other group levels, and why their first BBs were built with roller bearings. Oh yeah...BEARINGs....those things... the stuff that gets physically smaller and requiring higher tolerances when you keep the outside BB dimensions the same, and reduce the space available in the inside dimensions (from larger diameter spindle).