On Dec 1, 2:53 pm, Steve Palincsar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Piling on here, for a moment:
>
> Even if you discount concerns regarding future availability of
> freewheels, the current range of available gearing in 7 spd freewheels
> is limited compared to the range available with cassettes. My personal
> favorites, the 13-30, 13-34 and the 14-32 have no freewheel
> counterparts.
That partly depends on what numbers you like in between. Some
freewheels won't give you certain combinations, it's true, but other
less-than-optimum combinations are perfectly fine for city riding.
My two "regular" bikes both use freewheel hubs. Okay, Phil Wood
freewheel hubs. With hubs that durable, why not stick with freewheels?
And if they still have life left in them, why not go with slightly
used ones, especially if you run your bikes in friction?
Here's a helpful tip: Used-but-decent freewheels are popping up all
over ebay and craigslist and many can be had for less than ten bucks.
Combined with a new KMC Z-50 chain and run in pure friction I've
never, ever had a problem with them. No skipping, no chain-dropping,
nothing'.
Admittedly, I can usually find seemingly "dead' freewheels in the
metal recycling that a co-worker put there because they were "rusty"
or "too filthy to spend time cleaning" or whatever. In far too many
cases, those 5- and 6-speed freewheels -- mostly older Suntour
friction -- came back beautifully with some elbow grease and solvent
on my part. They had lots of life left in them, and shouldn't have
been tossed into the recycling bin just yet.
The 5-speed 14-32 on my All-Rounder and the 6-speed 14-30 on my
LongLow/city bike were both resurrected from our shop's metal
recycling bin. I have a box of perhaps seven or eight more of these,
all scavenged from various shops' recycling bins (I get around),
scrubbed clean and re-lubed with my trusty freewheel lubing tool (I
had fun explaining to a 24-year-old dealer rep the other day what the
tool was and what it was for. He grew up riding full-suspension ATB's
with cassettes. Last week it was a lesson on Helicomatic hubs; whoo-
whee!). After cleaning and lubing, each freewheel is wrapped carefully
and stored away. I expect I have enough to get me through the next
seven to ten years at the rate I ride. Call me a cheapskate. It's
okay. I probably am.
(Meanwhile, I have asked my co-workers to please show me their "dead"
freewheels before chucking them into the recycling. The last one I
fished out was -- get this! -- a Shimano 600, 6-speed 14-32 with some
rust on it. I scrubbed off most of the rust, cleaned out the gunk from
the bearings, and re-lubed it. Clearly labelled "used: cleaned & re-
lubed", it sold last week for 25 bucks to a collector. So there's
still lots of love out there for freewheels. IMHO, IRD and SunRace are
very smart to keep on making them.)
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