Cup and cone hub service - Deore m525

[l4dva]

In the end I got the complete axel assembly from bikeparts.com it worked out the same price as the two individual cones. I did the same for front and back wheel £25 all in along with the bearings too.

 

[l4dva]

Probably best to not buy ball bearings 'made for cycles' such as weldtite or any loose ball bearings from a cycle shop! They are generally worse than putting back the originals, and vary in size considerably. What's needed is graded ball bearings from a bearing specialist - they won't be much more expensive either. Grade 10 will be great, grade 30 will be more than acceptable, but again, not much difference in price.
ETA with the exception of the shimano bearings SJS are selling, which are likely to be good.

I did go down a rabbit hole of specialist ball bearings. And you’re right they are not that expensive. In the end the bearings came with the axel assembly so should be shimano part. For the next service I will do buy them from a specialist supplier and better grade

 

[l4dva]

I'd pull it apart and check that one of the balls hasn't fallen betwixt axle and hub. My son had this happen to a hub he was servicing recently and it produced the symptoms you're describing.

'Too much grease' wouldn't present like this.

I did count the balls in the cups to check I hadn’t lost any. Let’s see if the new cones/ balls help.

Good too know that too much grease wouldn’t be a problem as such. I’m still not sure if there is a rule to how much I should be filling the cups

 

[mickle]

I did count the balls in the cups to check I hadn’t lost any. Let’s see if the new cones/ balls help.

Good too know that too much grease wouldn’t be a problem as such. I’m still not sure if there is a rule to how much I should be filling the cups

However much grease you put in your hubs it's very likely to be more than Shi**no installed in the first instance.

The worst that can happen if you put in too much grease is you waste a load of grease, make the bike heavier and give yourself a bigger clean up job next time you clean the internals. Enough grease to hold the balls in place whilst you reassemble it is enough grease.

 

[rogerzilla]

Up to a point. In bearings without lip or labyrinth* seals, the grease is the only thing keeping water out, so you need enough to squeeze out and fill any gaps. The original M737 SPDs are a good example: they need a full purge of grease to keep them happy. Luckily, the design makes this quite easy. Older hubs (pre-1980s) of almost any type lack decent seals.

*Sturmey-Archer gear hubs have these

 

[scotsbikester]

I buy Grade 10 chrome steel from Simple Bearings. e.g.

Headset ball bearings

Though Simply Bearings site has become a little harder to navigate recently. Just go to the loose ball bearings section, rather than the "Cycling and bike bearings", which just seems to include Weldite bearings in cages. I haven't visited it for a while, as I bought job lots (100? 500?) of headset and hub bearings. It gets the price per ball down to next to nothing. I'll probably never buy any more.

Though stainless steel might seem a better choice, being rust resistant, it's not as good a choice as one might think, according to what I have read. Stainless steel isn't as hard as chrome steel, and in the case of galvanic corrosion the steel of the cones or cups will corrode first. Which isn't what you want, because they are harder/more expensive to replace than the loose balls. Somebody with engineering qualifications might be along soon to tell me I'm wrong.

Hopefully as long as the wheels spin every so often, and you put plenty of thickish grease in there, there's no reason they will rust. Though I suppose riding through a lot of water and cleaning the bike with a power washer might do them in.

 

[scotsbikester]

In the end I got the complete axel assembly from bikeparts.com it worked out the same price as the two individual cones. I did the same for front and back wheel £25 all in along with the bearings too.

I've got almost the same hubs as you. I've got M525A, front and back. Replacement parts don't seem anywhere near as common as for the slightly higher grade M756, which I now wish I'd got, but which aren't available any more. So I just bought spare complete M525A hubs, three rear and two front. That way I've got complete sets of cones, axles, lock nuts, balls, and most importantly, free hubs. And if it comes to it I can replace the cups, by having the wheel rebuilt.

 

[Gunk]

You'll struggle to eradicate any play with old fashioned cup and cone bearings, a tiny bit of play is better than them being too tight.

 

[l4dva]

I was also thinking that I could end up buying multiple 100's of bearings and struggle to use them all in my lifetime. Similar to all the tubs of grease that I have habit of buying for every specific use case.

Will look into it some more when ready for the next service, thanks for the link. Hopefully find a sensible volume to buy to keep me ticking over.

 

[fossyant]

You'll struggle to eradicate any play with old fashioned cup and cone bearings, a tiny bit of play is better than them being too tight.

I always assemble my hubs with a tiny bit of play, as once the QR is done up, this play is taken up through compression.

 

[l4dva]

New axel & bearings now installed on the front wheel. It's taken me a while to get round to it. Running nice and smoothly now.

The tightening adjustment from smooth spinning to horrible friction/hard spinning is really tiny and once you hit the sweet spinning point there is a tiny bit of play. I tried again for far too long to remove that play and still have it spin smoothly (just to see if it was possible) but I couldn't. In the end I left that small amount of play in as suggested by some of you here and it did go away once I got it clamped into the forks.

I'll give the rear wheel a go later today - Thanks again for all the help!

 

[scotsbikester]

New axel & bearings now installed on the front wheel. It's taken me a while to get round to it. Running nice and smoothly now.

The tightening adjustment from smooth spinning to horrible friction/hard spinning is really tiny and once you hit the sweet spinning point there is a tiny bit of play. I tried again for far too long to remove that play and still have it spin smoothly (just to see if it was possible) but I couldn't. In the end I left that small amount of play in as suggested by some of you here and it did go away once I got it clamped into the forks.

I'll give the rear wheel a go later today - Thanks again for all the help!

There is a whole thread somewhere on another forum I think about how to adjust cup and cone wheel bearings in QR hubs. I assume this has QRs? I don't think there's an M525 with through axles.

What you need is some way to apply the pressure of the QR, while still leaving the cone and locknut adjustable. Here it is:

How to adjust C&C hubs.

I follow the method used by 531Colin, about the 21st post I think. Though I use washers at the top and a piece of angle iron with a hole drilled in it instead of the "hole in the spanner". I need to refine my thing though, the washers tend to bend. Basically you're applying pressure to the end of the axle, to do the compression. But the cone and locknut are still available for adjustment.

Stein do a product that makes it available. If I ran a bike shop I'd buy one: Stein hub axle vice.

I quite enjoy the adjustment process. The difference between too tight, too loose, and just right is very small. Somebody, somewhere else, actually has a graph of damage to bearings due to under/over tightening. Basically if it's a tiny bit too tight, damage rapidly increases, whereas if it's a tiny bit too loose, it's probably not an issue, at least not until it's way too loose.

The general opinion is that Shimano Hubs, when new, are:

1. Too tight
2. Don't have enough grease.

I assume, though time will tell, that my adjustment works. Once on the bike I feel no play whatsoever, but the wheels spin freely. The front a lot longer than the rear, obviously. The other day, just for fun, I set the front wheel spinning, with a lot of force, and literally managed to go and make a coffee, come back, and it was still spinning. My wife was watching, though she wasn't as impressed as I hoped she would be. Some people just don't understand mechanical beauty. Oh, and the races look perfect BTW.

PS, please note spelling of axle, unless you mean this:
Tonya's triple axel.
One of my favourite bits of sporting film, look how overjoyed Tonya is.

 

[l4dva]

I've got almost the same hubs as you. I've got M525A, front and back. Replacement parts don't seem anywhere near as common as for the slightly higher grade M756, which I now wish I'd got, but which aren't available any more. So I just bought spare complete M525A hubs, three rear and two front. That way I've got complete sets of cones, axles, lock nuts, balls, and most importantly, free hubs. And if it comes to it I can replace the cups, by having the wheel rebuilt.

I might have spoken too soon. I picked up the correct front axle parts, but the rear axle was totally incorrect - I only released when trying to fit it.

Quick call with Bikeparts.com confirmed I ordered the wrong part, and they don't stock the correct one. Searching around some more now seems like it might be hard to find the rear axle parts too. Will keep trying

 

[scotsbikester]

I might have spoken too soon. I picked up the correct front axle parts, but the rear axle was totally incorrect - I only released when trying to fit it.

Quick call with Bikeparts.com confirmed I ordered the wrong part, and they don't stock the correct one. Searching around some more now seems like it might be hard to find the rear axle parts too. Will keep trying

There's M525 and M525A.

There is a difference, but I'm not sure what it is. What wouldn't fit in yours? I think the A version has been out for a long time, mine are 8 years old now. So I daresay that any replacement parts are actually for the A version.

It's a regret to me that I went with those hubs, rather than the M756, just because a quick search reveals that parts for M756 fit a lot of other hubs, so are a lot more available. Whereas M525 and M525A are outliers, it seems.

I've future proofed my hubs by buying two spare front hubs and three spare rears, identical to the ones on the bike. Expensive, but at least I know I won't have any problems.

 

[l4dva]

I brought M595 parts - so got that totally wrong! The cones and washers where totally different. Luckily, I haven't opened the packet so I can still return it.

It looks like the parts suggest by "Ming the Merciless" above are the cones for the M525A. AI searches are telling me the cones are different M525A vs M525. Not sure how reliable AI is on that one? I've emailed SJS Cycles to see if they stock it or if they can track down the correct one, before I buy the incorrect one again.

Will see if I can find another complete hub (new or second hand) too