Rebuilt the coaster today.
This is a standard Bendix Red Band 2, as-received from a RRB member. (Don't recall who...oops!)
Took it apart. Really dry in there, with crusted-on grease. Not too thick, but stuck-on pretty good.
Going to switch some stuff out and add some stuff. For instance, I'm going to switch the basic flanged nutz for some nicer ones, with the captured washers. Of course, I want to use at least one Wald item; this build was lacking anything Wald ("When the best just won't do!"), so i'm rocking the #6003 Coaster Strap. The axle, which may well be older than i am if it's original, will be replaced with a stronger one; Wheels Manufacturing makes a cromo axle in the required 3/8"x24tpi flavor. Let's see, what else, what else? Oh, the standard steel caged bearings will be replaced with freakin' Silicon Ntride (Si3N4) ceramic bearings. I got 50 1/4" balls; I figure i'll need 36 to 38 total. Oh, and more pimpness coming at you, via the stainless-steel Mr.Tick coaster brake arm, which fits Bendix and, apparently, Morrow coaster hubs. It also features a bottle opener.
I wanted to switch the rear sprocket out, ditching the oem 19t for a new-production Shimano 23t. Turns out (and, after trying to force it on, i kinda re-remembered this), the Shimano would have to be filed down a bit to fit on the Bendix driver. Even the snapring is a wee bit bigger for the Bendix. As my fellow RRBers have been reminding me lately, i have limited time on this build, so i figured "forget that; i'll run the 19t!" I have plenty of chainrings and front sprockets to choose from; i'll sort the gear ratio out later.
Cleaned everything up, beveled the brake shoes; ready to repack...
Gonna use the red sauce for this one. Lucas Red'N'Tacky is my go-to for coaster-brake hubs; it has a very high-temp drop-off point, and it lasts a long time between repacks. Plus, the extreme stickiness of the stuff comes in handy when you're converting to loose balls from caged retainer bearings. A lot of bike companies will try to sell you on some high-dollar ceramic-specific grease, but it seems like that's just some snake-oil. Regular grease works fine with ceramic, and these Si3N4 jawns will theoretically spin better and cooler while withstanding higher temperatures than steel bearings. I might not ever need all of that, but i'm pretty much building the most obsessive rear klunker wheel i've ever seen, so....
Si3N4 balls in the brakeside race. Notice, i left a 1ball-sized gap to allow free spinning; you can see the gap to the left of the brake cone. Don't worry; i slathered plenty more grease on there before i covered all that up with the dust cover, brake arm, and jam-nut.
Same thing on driveside...
Greased it up good....
And the same kinda thing in the driver race...
After that, I of course put the driveside cone and jam-nut on the axle, and tightened it up a bit. Going to save final adjustment for when i'm actually mounting everything. That's all the pics for now; i gotta lace this wheel, right!?
I'll post close-up pics of the rebuilt hub with the new brake-arm installed when i get the wheel built and pics uploaded....
I still have, what, 5 days for this thing? I can do this! (Frame/fork/bars/spider are at the powdercoaters....he says it'll be done Monday....or Tuesday....or maybe Wednesday! OOOOOPS! Better late than never, right? FWIW, i went with RAL6018, which is a shade or two darker than Kawasaki Green, for the bike....
Should end up looking like some kind of Sprite soda tribute bike, although that really wasn't my intention....
Getting the frame back from powder Friday AM... HOPING to have her built by friday night, so i can make the race. Not entirely sure that's realistic, anymore. But, the April 1st deadline for ths buildoff seems totally obtainable....
