Riding along in busy traffic, need to unclip quickly, turn foot and nothing at the lights, it stayed clipped in.

I can track stand / unclip from other side so no worries but made me think. Didn’t matter how much force was exerted on the shoe after taking my foot out, it wasn’t going to unclip from the pedal. If I had fallen at an awkward angle it could have easily taken out a knee or ankle. All caused by a screw falling out. Torqued right but not checked for maybe 8 rides max. The cleat just stayed locked in to the cleat and rotated on its remaining screw.

PSA: Make sure your cleat bolts are tightened!

You can put a drop of blue loctite on cleat bolt threads.

I had this once years ago. I fell over.

Once, I carry a spare bolt in my bum bag to prevent this happening again.

Yep, it was bloody horrible- was about 30 miles from home and every time I had to stop was like russian roulette to see if I’d remember I couldn’t unclip my normal foot-putting-down foot.

Think I’m going to move to Look 3 screw cleats for commuting / road now. The screws on the SPD’s had loctite on them and a relatively quiet life before.

Was thinking of moving to SPD for off-road / enduro with a DMR SPD but this has put me off.

You could always smack on some red loctite, it’s semi-permanent. TBH I don’t think it’s really enough of an issue to change shoes, if you just get the threads good and clean, apply new loctite and torque right it should be fine.

It’s a bit of an over reaction for something that can be solved by just checking them occasionally.

And all other cleats use bolts so the same problem can occur.

Flat pedals would prevent the problem happening again but I don’t know what you would do if you lost a pin?

In an emergency you can always use a disc bolt or put a spare bolt on a bottle cage, rack boss etc, they’re the same pitch as spd bolts

Yeah, I’ve been using SPD’s for about 15 years and it only happened the once. I rarely check mine tbh and don’t use loctite on them either so I don’t think its really a thing to be worried about.

happened once in the middle of nowhere in northern sweden. i think i used a disc brake rotor bolt as a bodge? or am i dreaming

@kilo you beat me to it, have used a disc bolt in emergencies before

It happened to a mate of mine at the bottom of Jacob’s Ladder quite early on in a Peaks loop.
He ended up taking the cleat out & riding with only one foot clipped in for the rest of the day.

Stashing a spare somewhere sounds like a good idea!

I had this once. Only discovered on the commute home, plus my seat post clamp had broken so I had to ride stood up the whole way (10 miles), with a broken cleat. Was a nightmare at lights, especially as it was my right foot and I ALWAYS put my left foot down and right foot up at lights. Had to swap for that one right only

I haven’t had a screw go missing, but I have had a bolt come loose on my speedplay cleats giving an annoying creaking noise.
I removed, checked, cleaned and replaced cranks and bottom bracket before tracking it down to my shoe.

Never happened to me, but my issue’s generally one of not being able to undo them and so they get a dab of grease. As such I periodically clean the heads and quarter-turn them and I suppose this serves as some sort of check. Maybe I’ll swap the grease for loctite as it’s evidently of high-consequence.

Yep, it was bloody horrible- was about 30 miles from home and every time I had to stop was like russian roulette to see if I’d remember I couldn’t unclip my normal foot-putting-down foot.

Um… take bolt from non-preferred side ???

A tri-athlete would just pop his foot out of the shoe.

Yep – coming down a Lake District descent on a cold February day as the light was just dying…

A tri-athlete would just pop his foot out of the shoe and crash horribly (ftfy)

I’ve had it happen, I subsequently replaced a cable mount bolt on my frame with a cleat bolt as a spare. I now do my cleats up a bit tighter and use loctite. I figure as the bolt and the cleat plate thingy are both steel it won’t matter if I do them up extra tight

I found that the internal plates(the screw screws into ) are just pressed metal and theres nothing beefy to screw into. I have found over tightening the screw can split this mount, meaning the screw is forever loose and prone to falling out.

Yes yes dont over tighten, but with such a flimsy system thats far easier then many would realize.

Not sure if its changed, but the hex interface for allen keys was always prone to chewing. You can get torx countersunk bolts which are considerably better and eliminate this from happening. I changed mine to stainless steel torx.

Quite common, apparently. Happened to my wife a couple of weeks ago – she said her shoe/pedal felt a bit odd, then got off to walk a steep rocky section and realise the spd was flopping around. We were only a couple of minutes from Dunkeld so nipped into Progression – no cleats in stock, but he gave us a bolt (and checked/tightened the rest), free. Meant the 20 mile ride home was a bit better than it might have been.

Yes yes dont over tighten, but with such a flimsy system thats far easier then many would realize.

Not sure if its changed, but the hex interface for allen keys was always prone to chewing. You can get torx countersunk bolts which are considerably better and eliminate this from happening. I changed mine to stainless steel torx.

These two issues are related.

I keep a spare in my trail kit because it’s happened to me a couple of times.

Anyone got a link to the steel torx ones?

A tri-athlete would just pop his foot out of the shoe and crash horribly (ftfy) pop into the nearest cervelo store to buy the latest 10grand mega bike

surely?

Anyone got a link to the steel torx ones?

This is the kind of thing youre after. I got mine from a chandlers and had to cut them down.

https://www.accu.co.uk/en/hexalobular-countersunk-screws/474434-SHK-M5-18-V2-A4?uk_google_shopping=1&c=3&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIkZDOh4zK8AIVxITVCh0U7Q4xEAQYBSABEgJSZ_D_BwE