How to Overhaul Shimano Hubs

How to Overhaul Shimano Hubs There is a groove here in the 11-tooth, and you got to keep that clean because cog is so small that there is not actually enough room for the chain roller to hit here, and then have the chain plate drop down. So out here at the end the space is reinforced, but then this groove is here to allow a place for that. The plate of the chain is set down. You can even see that they still hit. There is a mark at every one of these from the chain plate, and 12 have a thicker spacer. You see how thick they made it. It's still every plate pair is still hitting that spacer. So again in order to get full engagement here, you have to have a standard chain dimension. So if you use a Wipperman Connex Link that's upside down, the bump will force to push the roller to be up too high, and it will skip in both 11 and the 12. I am just picking out the large junk and pieces of grass and sticks and stuff, and you can see this is a pretty dirty ugly mass here. So to overhaul the hub, you remove the router. So now we need to find the proper cone wrench. Anyway, for the rear hub you need 217 millimeter cone wrenches. Now here is the cone, that's a just a spacer here as your lock knot and here is the cone. There are your bearings. Each one of these cones is sort of a labyrinth seal system with a ball ring in there, and then this shield that comes over the top, and it fits over this lip of this dust cap. We are going to knock the balls through to the inside, so they just roll down through the center. So it is 9 on each side. I have got the balls all cleaned. First thing I am going to do is lube them inside of the Shimano Freehub. The only way you really have to do it is to may be drip oil around here and hope that it goes in there. The Shimano Freehub body looks like this. It's got poles. The spring is just a band that goes around and makes it flip up sort of a rocket kind of an idea, and there are two sets of loose ball bearings there, all that needs lubrication. Even if you could flow it in there, the dust cap first of all is keeping you from being able to get out and secondly, you could only put a very thin lubricant in there that would flow in. You want to have something in there that's actually going to protect it, and let the balls roll and stuff. This is where the big balls that you just saw coming out for the axle. This tool here seals into the bearing race. This seals against those and prevents lube from going into those, and then this seals against the walls in here to prevent lube from coming back out. And then there is a hole that goes in here and comes out here. When the thing is dirty, that's the only way you can get solvent in there, and you can flush it out. And then you can pump in. This is actually Morning Star Freehub Soup, which is a special mixture electric lube, we call it that allows you too lubricate it. You need to be able to get this dust cap out of there. The problem is that that's just a thin dust cap that's stamped out of steel, and it wasn't really meant to be removed. If you remove it, this is a Morning Star J tool that allows you to get it out of there, but if you do this, you need to have a Morning Star replacement dust shield. Then it's going to fit down in here, except that it's going to be removable. So put it over a bucket if you are going to flush it out and jam that Freehub body in there. Now I am going to use Bio-Degreaser to squirt in there. There you can see, that's coming clearly, coming through the Freehub. That's exactly what I want right there. This is something if you ride your bike a lot to do twice a year, and then if you do it before the winter, you can put in some thinner lube, and if you do it before it gets warm, you can put in some thicker lube. One thing nice about the Freehub body is it allows to actually screw in the top of a gear oil whose outboard motor lower unit gear lube. This stuff works great in a Freehub. Now I'm squeezing out my degreaser. Turn this over, and kind of with that, I'll let the solvent run off. Now I did put the gear oil in there, so it's not a three step process. You put one or the other, but I wanted to show you both, and this is my preferred lubricant. And as you do this, you just have to kind of turn it, and it's now pushed up the remainder of the solvent, and as well as pushed out the outboard motor gear oil, and there it all that Morning Star Freehub Soup in there. I'll clean this thing up. You just got a wiping job to do here, and I am no longer having any flowing issues of any solvents or Freehub lubricants flowing around in here. Since that's the path of entry for dirt into the hub is around through this labyrinth seal, you might as well get it out of there and clean it. Fill it with clean grease, so new dirt has to get beyond that rather than pushing all the dirt in ahead of it. You particularly don't want anything in these outer threads because as you tighten this cone down then it could push dirt into the newly cleaned and greased bearings you put in. Smother some grease into the bearing rays. I have greased, pick them up, push them in there. So those bearings are all in there. Let me go to the other side, I am going to take our new Morning Star Dust Shield. Press it down in there. Now I'll take our axle and drop it in, flip it over, and set it on that end, so that these bearings now no longer can fall inward, and we'll get this cone started on there. Now is the adjustment part, the cones take a 15-millimeter cone wrench, but the cone on this side, you can no longer get to because it's down inside there. And the lock knots take a 17, the 15 on the cone. Number 17 on here, and tighten those against each other, and the now we are going to feel the hub adjustment. It's feeling very good, and there is just slightest amount of play in there. Now we have this nice Morning Star Dust Cap in there. So now we can do this anytime without nearly the amount of hassle because we are going just pop that dust cap out. So now without touching the router because my hands, I can't guarantee there is not still some grease on them. Same tool as a cassette cog lock ring, and you just tighten it on there tightly and that wheel is done. This thing is going to ride great.