1996/1997 Shamal HPW hub + 11 speed woes
 

I have a couple of sets of older Shamal wheel sets I think they are 96/97 they're silver with 12 spoke HPW hubs. I was hoping to use them with an 11 speed cogset. The free hub bodies are 9 speed, the 11 speed cluster slips on without problems and they have previously worked with 10 speed clusters.

The thing is that the largest sprocket on the 11 speed cluster is not flat at the back, the teeth are offset towards the spokes. This means that when you tighten the lockring the back of the largest sprocket squeezes against the hub body where the spokes are seated and the cluster won't spin.

On one of the hubs the small lip on the free hub body that should mate with the back of the largets sprocket sits about 1mm proud of the hub body and on the other it less than 1/2 mm proud of the hub body of course the 2nd one has the most squishing when you tighten the lock ring.

This difference makes me think that there might be some way to adjust the axle so that it moves 1 or 2 mm towards the drive side taking the free hub body with it. Is this possible? Do you have any other thoughts.

These are my first builds everything has gone fine so far and I'm ready to do the cables and wrap the bars so it's frustrating to have a hold up like this. It would be ashame if I had to go for a more modern wheelset as the Shamals look fantastic on the old steel frames that I'm using.

Thanks guys.

Axle adjustment does not affect where the freehub rides in relation to the hub body. Also if you moved the freehub away from (out of the hub body) the pawls wouldn't engage the body correctly leading to early failure and it probably wouldn't seal correctly which would lead to dirt getting into the pawl/bearing area.

Does anything affect where the freehub rides in relation to the hub body or am I screwed?

Decided I'm going to run 10 cogs on the rear.