S
Simon Brooke
Guest
in message <[email protected]>, Geraint Jones
('[email protected]') wrote:
> It was the thin trickle of rusty grease from the bottom headstock
> bearing
> that made me strip it down, your honour... eventually traceable to a
> leak at the bolt at the top of the (quill) stem, and a rusty bit of
> cast iron pretending to be the nut-cum-spreader bit (whatever that's
> called) but
> that's another story. (What is that called? Is it on Guy's naming of
> parts relay?)
The star-fangled nut, often abbreviated to the star nut.
> Anwyay, the cage and balls in the bottom bearing were clearly scrap,
> so I got out my packet of -- um, er, they're not here any more, but I
> think
> they were 5/32", that's what they would be, isn't it? -- 5/32" balls.
>
> Ah, but how many? There's the random number! Everyone (as in
> Richard) just tells you that there are so many different bearings,
> it's whatever
> number you took out, but that can't be right, can it? I mean if
> there were twenty balls in the cage, then twenty loose balls cannot
> possibly
> be right, can it? Is there a fiddle-factor?
The right number of balls is the number which will fit in packed tightly
together, minus one. For the bearing to work the balls must /not/ be
packed tightly together - they must each have room individually to
turn. So in pretty much any bearing on a bike, pack balls of the right
size in until you can't get any more in - and then /take/ /one/ /out/.
--
[email protected] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/
;; IE 3 is dead, but Netscape 4 still shambles about the earth,
;; wreaking a horrific vengeance upon the living
;; anonymous
('[email protected]') wrote:
> It was the thin trickle of rusty grease from the bottom headstock
> bearing
> that made me strip it down, your honour... eventually traceable to a
> leak at the bolt at the top of the (quill) stem, and a rusty bit of
> cast iron pretending to be the nut-cum-spreader bit (whatever that's
> called) but
> that's another story. (What is that called? Is it on Guy's naming of
> parts relay?)
The star-fangled nut, often abbreviated to the star nut.
> Anwyay, the cage and balls in the bottom bearing were clearly scrap,
> so I got out my packet of -- um, er, they're not here any more, but I
> think
> they were 5/32", that's what they would be, isn't it? -- 5/32" balls.
>
> Ah, but how many? There's the random number! Everyone (as in
> Richard) just tells you that there are so many different bearings,
> it's whatever
> number you took out, but that can't be right, can it? I mean if
> there were twenty balls in the cage, then twenty loose balls cannot
> possibly
> be right, can it? Is there a fiddle-factor?
The right number of balls is the number which will fit in packed tightly
together, minus one. For the bearing to work the balls must /not/ be
packed tightly together - they must each have room individually to
turn. So in pretty much any bearing on a bike, pack balls of the right
size in until you can't get any more in - and then /take/ /one/ /out/.
--
[email protected] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/
;; IE 3 is dead, but Netscape 4 still shambles about the earth,
;; wreaking a horrific vengeance upon the living
;; anonymous
