about those pawls in the free hub - grease

[eddief]

when i got my C4 hubs, the rear hub had that annoying and relatively loud click when free wheeling. so i greasd the pawls and now all is silent, which i like. are the pawls supposed to be greased and why don't they grease em mo bettah at the fatory?

[Joachim]

I put one drop of synthetic oil on each of the pawls. Bearings get grease.

[pitcrew]

Generally speaking, grease can cause the prawls to not engage fully/properly/at all/etc....

You usually end up shopping for some new teeth when/if this happens.....

[guyintense]

Grease can effect the engagement especially in Mavic hubs.

[old_fat_and_slow]

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[Bob Loblaw]

Common wisdom specifies oil. As an experiment, I decided to lube my Campy Chorus freehub with Phil Wood grease. 8,000 miles of silence, and working fine in temps down to ten degrees F. I regrease it every season or two. YMMV.

BL

[Jaq]

Grease bad, oil GOOD.

Really? Hm. I thought I was supposed to put the grease-gun nozzle to the grease-port hole of the Record hubs and pump till a little grease ran from the overflow. The resulting silence from the ratchets/pawls implies that they're heavily greased.

I've never had a problem, though I ride in LA and the coldest it ever gets is about 35 degrees, and then not for very long at all.

So I should open the hubs, clean & re-lube with oil?

[chismog]

This is an interesting thread. Personally, I dislike loud freehubs. When I tore down my White Ind hubs last season I added some Phil tenacious oil to the pawls. It just didn't work at all; the pawls got stuck immediately and I had a no-speed bike. I have to think Phil green grease would do the same thing? The Mavic stuff is basically mineral oil.

I'm wondering if pawl design has a huge part of whether grease (or heavy oil) is going to work or not on a given freehub? Clearly it didn't work on the White, but my recent teardown of Campy OS hubs shows the pawls are wider and use a different spring type. Given that the grease port is there... I have to wonder how you'd avoid greasing the pawls if you used the port?

[Louis]

Finish Line Lube options (http://www.finishlineusa.com/downloads/pdf/Lube_for_Every_Cyclist_Chart.pdf)

I use the Cross Country Wet for freewheels and cassette pawls.

http://www.finishlineusa.com/products/product-images/WET_Lube_Family_th.jpg

[eddief]

when you remove the skewer there is a dust cap held on by an o ring over the end of the hub. when u pull off the cap, then the free hub can move outward by a bit. i put some park grease on a brush and brushed it in there. hope i did no damage. but from very pronounced click to complete silence. no malfunc yet.

[oldpotatoe]

when i got my C4 hubs, the rear hub had that annoying and relatively loud click when free wheeling. so i greasd the pawls and now all is silent, which i like. are the pawls supposed to be greased and why don't they grease em mo bettah at the fatory?


cuz wen ya greeze pawls de stick down bustin out all yer teef.

Use oil. I use Mobil One, even favored by NASCAR.

[eddief]

Yes, he lives and seems to be listening and watching:

We use Shell Alvania EP grease (Shell recently replaced this with Gadus S2) http://www.mil-specproducts.com/productPage.aspx?getProd=SHELL-GADUS-HS-COUP-GRS. It's a NLGI number 1 (soft) lithium based grease designed to operate under high sheer pressure with high salt water protection and anti corrosion properties. If you put some on your fingers it feels the consistency of really soft spreadable margarine.


Anything heavier than that can lead to the pawls sticking, particularly in cold weather. Adding another type of grease can lead to issues with the bases not mixing and chemical breakdown.


We don't apply much because a lot of it isn't needed. A thin film on the ratchet ring and pawls is ideal. We measure with a syringe the amount applied to each hub. While a little more will make the system quieter, it can lead to clogging and excess drag, the opposite of what the lubricant is supposed to do.

[old_fat_and_slow]

.

[MattTuck]

I like quiet hubs also, but I feel like you've bought the wrong hubs if you are using grease (a lubricant) as a sound insulator.

[eddief]

maybe, out of being a novice, i used a sledge hammer when a something less intense would have done the job. if my hub was delivered with slightly less than the right amount of the correct grease, then maybe the click was more than it should have been. then i hammered it with grease. now time to do it as prescribed and check the result. i knew the hubs were clicky before the purchase, so can easily live with that at less risk to losing my teef.

and so easy to get in there to do the job. who knew:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqBVaaFaXkU

I like quiet hubs also, but I feel like you've bought the wrong hubs if you are using grease (a lubricant) as a sound insulator.

[chismog]

Alright... oil it is.

But what about those grease ports on the Campy hubs? How do the pawls not get stuffed full of grease when you use those? Not that I do...

[nbrewste]

I use a very, very light coating of Shimano Special Grease (a little bit goes a long way) and a drop or two of triflow. The grease is super lightweight and does not cause the sticking like Tenacious Oil or other, heavier, bearing specific greases.

Shimano makes a version of their Special Grease specifically for freehubs. http://www.petracycles.co.uk/product_info.php?language=en&currency=USD&products_id=5948&source=googleus .

[Jaq]

Hehe.

So a little googling led to various cycling forums in which this topic was broached (oil vs. grease) and replied to; some threads are almost 8 years old. (http://www.cyclingforums.com/t/171426/lubing-campy-record-hubs/15)

OP, I'm surprised how testy you were way back in ought-four. ;)

So: a shot of oil in the "oil" port (as opposed to "grease" port) every thousand miles or so, and then repack the bearings with actual grease about every five thousand miles?

[wallymann]

but i've always used grease with my grease-port equipped campy freehubs. pedro's syn-lube originally until it ran out.

with grease ports i can keep the grease fresh so easily, lately i just use cheapie lithium-based grease from lowe's that threads right onto my syn-gun.

i live in MI which gets pretty cold and have yet to have a problem w/ sticking/slipping pawls (touch wood) on my campy freehubs. although i do have messy seepage from the freehub right after a fresh load of grease.

on my modern powertap freehub, grease did cause a sticking-pawl problem so i had to use something lighter.