On Dec 1, 2008, at 6:14 PM, Steve Palincsar wrote: > It's not much trouble removing and replacing a cassette: > I've never heard of anybody having to use a six foot cheater bar to > remove a cassette lockring, and I can't imagine ever stripping out the > removal slot on a cassette lockring. I doubt there are many old > timers > who haven't stripped a freewheel when trying to get it off, and I > don't > think there are many tandem owners with freewheels who haven't had > trouble unscrewing them.
This may have reminded Jim Thill of the tale of my freewheel at his shop. It was a Sachs 7 speed on a Phil hub that lives on my old A/ R. The wheel was built in 1996 and the freewheel was off once or twice in the next couple of years, put back on with liberal amounts of Phil grease on the threads, but since a 135 mm/7 speed has only about 1 mm of dish, I've never broken a spoke in 12+ years despite being a 220 lb guy. I tried to get it off once to replace it, around 2000 or so, and it was stuck on the hub. Actually broke the tool at the bike shop I took it to. But freewheels don't wear out in the bearings very readily, cogs can be replaced and so there wasn't much reason to take the freewheel off, until finally I could no longer find replacement cogs and the chain was starting to skip. So I got a new 7 speed freewheel, rolled up my sleeves, put the freewheel tool in the vice and the wheel on the tool. I turned the wheel. Nothing. Double checked the "righty tighty, lefty loosey" thing. Tried again. Nada. Twisted harder. Zip. Even twisted the tool into a slight spiral. Nope. My vice spun around on the workbench. The freewheel mocked me and whispered derisory comments. So, knowing the reputation that Jim's genius mechanic has for these things, I rode over to Jim's shop with new freewheel in tow and presented my dilemma to Mongo. I figured I'd be home before dark. Two solid hours later, the freewheel was still on the hub. We'd tried the shop vice- we flexed the vice jaws alarmingly. We tried a giant cheater bar. We disassembled the freewheel down to the bit left on the hub. We tried a huge pipe wrench. We tried a big hammer and a drift punch. We tried a torch. We tried an air impact wrench and exhausted the compressor's capacity. We tried all these things in various combinations. Mongo took it over to the chop shop across the street and tried *their* giant compressor with a bigger air wrench. We tried various penetrating oils. Nothing. Not a tiniest fraction of an inch of budging. I got a ride home from Jim's business partner and left the bike at the shop. This was ignominious, I haven't left a bike at a shop for repair in 30 years (back before I worked at a bike shop). Mongo called the next day to say it was done. I was busy with a prior commitment so my wonderful wife went and picked it up for me- he'd apparently had to use an angle grinder to finally get the darned thing off. I didn't ask for too many details. Some things are better left a mystery! 4+ hours total labor. The new freewheel works great. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
