Sturmey Archer Hub

[taxing]

I just bought a second hand Raleigh Stowaway with a 3 speed Sturmey Archer hub and the gears don't work. Second is fine, but when I go down to third it will either stay in gear for 20 seconds max then slip out, or just doesn't engage at all, so the pedals are just turning but there's nothing happening. First is even worse, I turn the grip shift and nothing happens at all. It stays in second gear, and as soon as I let go of the handlebar it moves itself back to second. From a bit of reading around it seems that the problem with third gear can be solved with some adjustment, but I haven't come across mention of the problem I've described with the first gear - could that be solved by adjustment too, or is it a more serious problem?

I'm not mechanically minded but I'm willing to give it a go because this bike was cheap, so please speak slowly. I doubt it will help, but here's a picture of my bike because I think it's good looking.

 

[TheDoctor]

Nice looking bike - very retro!

First off, I'd get some oil in there - there should be a clip thingy in the hub. Open it up and put some oil in.
Then adjust the cable as per Sheldon.
He explains it better than I could.

 

[ASC1951]

I'm not mechanically minded but I'm willing to give it a go ....

You're a brave man. As you can guess, I have an ancient Sturmey 3 Speed Fixed hub but I have never dared dibble about inside it. I mean, have you seen the Exploded View?

Tony Hadland is reckoned to be the guru of old SA hubs. I would start here http://www.hadland.m.../samaintind.htm

 

[threebikesmcginty]

Is that a cat carved into that tree or has my LSD just kicked in?

 

[potsy]

You're a brave man. As you can guess, I have an ancient Sturmey 3 Speed Fixed hub but I have never dared dibble about inside it. I mean, have you seen the Exploded View?

Tony Hadland is reckoned to be the guru of old SA hubs. I would start here http://www.hadland.m.../samaintind.htm

You're even braver calling Taxing a man

 

[awfulquiet]

Is that a cat carved into that tree or has my LSD just kicked in?

Pass me one mate?

That's a cat... Cheshire maybe?

 

[tyred]

Definitely have a look at the gear cable adjustment and work some oil into the cable. Something else to consider, these twist shifts have a very poor reputation for unintentional gear changes. I have one on my R20 and now have it working fine after some messing about. If you open it, you will find a small ball bearing (5/32" iirc) on a type of spring with different positions to lock it in each of the three gear positions. Give the spring a slight bend to tighten it and replace the ball bearing and add some light oil to the whole mechanism or maybe best replace with the normal Sturmey trigger shifter which rarely gives problems and are cheap to buy.

Lovely bike by the way. Well worth sorting out this minor issue.

 

[MacB]

if you want to have a go yourself then there's an excellent strip and rebuild video on the CTC forum from Graham:-

http://forum.ctc.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=34132

this works but you do need a little cone spanner thingy. You can buy internal spares from Oldbiketrader, SJS Cycles and Freemans cycles, or go on e-bay. Another alternative is to ring round your local bike shops and find a mechanic happy to sort it with you. When I first mooted an SA hub my LBS, owner and mechanic, both provlaimed that they could strip and rebuild blindfolded. If that's not an option then you could send the wheel to Derek at Oldbiketrader to do a rebuild for you.

I've given up on my new 3 speed twist shifter as the locking ring cracked and have ordered myself an old style down tube shifter instead.

Even if the hub internals are totally shot, very unlikely, a new set can be slotted in to the shell.

 

[RedBike]

You're a brave man. As you can guess, I have an ancient Sturmey 3 Speed Fixed hub but I have never dared dibble about inside it. I mean, have you seen the Exploded View?

Tony Hadland is reckoned to be the guru of old SA hubs. I would start here http://www.hadland.m.../samaintind.htm

I really fancied one of those 3 speed fixed wheel hubs. I came very close to buying one a few times.

The thing that worried me most was just what would happen if the hub suddenly changed gear on its own?
I can remember riding being a kid and riding my friends bike with a 3 speed sturmey archer gears. Everytime she made a right hand turn the bike changed gear on it own.

 

[Chris S]

>> when I go down to third it will either stay in gear for 20 seconds max then slip out, or just doesn't engage at all, so the pedals are just turning but there's nothing happening.
>> First is even worse, I turn the grip shift and nothing happens at all.

These both sound like adjustment problems, take a look at his link:
http://www.sheldonbr...archer/adj.html

I've got a 1970's Raleigh with a Sturmey Archer hub and it's given me no problems since I corrected the adjustment.

 

[buddha]

I really fancied one of those 3 speed fixed wheel hubs. I came very close to buying one a few times.

The thing that worried me most was just what would happen if the hub suddenly changed gear on its own?
I can remember riding being a kid and riding my friends bike with a 3 speed sturmey archer gears. Everytime she made a right hand turn the bike changed gear on it own.

Reminds me of when the shifter for my 5-speed broke. I wanted to shift down to 1st gear, but the plastic shifter snapped - releasing all the tension in the shifter cable. It went straight to 5th gear. All 100 gear inches of it on a bike with 2 full panniers at the bottom of a 20% hill! That was a tough ride home.

 

[RedBike]

Reminds me of when the shifter for my 5-speed broke. I wanted to shift down to 1st gear, but the plastic shifter snapped - releasing all the tension in the shifter cable. It went straight to 5th gear. All 100 gear inches of it on a bike with 2 full panniers at the bottom of a 20% hill! That was a tough ride home.

With a standard hub the gear automatically changing is highly annoying but all that happens is that you either find yourself in a gear thats too large or you end up freewheeling.

With a fixed gear hub however you have to pedal at a cadence that matches your bikes gear/speed. So a sudden gear change will mean a sudden change in cadence, something which struck me as highly dangerous.

 

[ASC1951]

You're even braver calling Taxing a man

I grovel. Sorry, m'dear - I didn't look at the Profile.

These days I have to lean forward to read the text and anything to the left of it is a bit out of focus...

 

[taxing]

Thanks all, I had been on Sheldon's site and found a bit on Sturmey Archer hubs, but not the bit on adjusting them. Sometimes I can look and look and never find what I want, when it's blindingly obvious to everyone else.

I'll let you know how it goes. Eek. My brother is a mechanic, so he's fully expecting to right whatever wrongs I do to the poor bike. Car mechanic, but the skills seem to transfer. He knows his way around an exploded diagram, anyway.

P.S. Yes, there's a cat carved into the tree. There are a few posh streets around here that have got loads of these tree carvings, there's a woodland animals one, a dragon one, and loads more.

P.P.S. I'm not a man, but I've been called worse. You are, of course, forgiven.

 

[tyred]

The gear adjustment article is here.

I would definitely attempt gear adjustment before opening the hub. These things are basically bullet-proof and rarely need attention. Having said that, if it's been out of action for a long time or someone has used a very heavy oil, it may be gunged up. In which case, you could open it, wash in white spirits and rebuilt it and lubricate it with fresh oil. You could achieve a similar result by filling it with diesel or WD40 and letting it sit for a while and then drain it out (fine oil will probably leak out anyway). Then put fresh oil in it. Many will probably tell you not to fill it with WD40 but I've done this a few times and it causes no problems.

But try oiling the cable and adjusting it first and consider an "upgrade" to the normal trigger shifter found on roadsters of the period. It really does work better.