Sincitycycler

1982 Bianchi Nuovo Allouro with Campy downtube shifters. Can this be done?

Little Darwin

https://www.sheldonbrown.com/harris/freewheels.html

If your shifters are friction shifters, then you should be fine.

I plan on making that change to my Cannondale soon.

Wildwood 

Other than 1 extra cog, what are the advantages to moving to 7 gears?
Could it be primarily for availability of parts?

top506

High-speed low-drag freewheels, for starters.
I'm running a 13-30 SunRace and one of the Shimano 11-28 superfreewheels at the moment. Both shift FAR smoother than the Atom, Regina, and Sun Tour freewheels I grew up with.
Top

Road Fan

Don't want to discourage you, but this might or not be easy, at the end of the day. I've found that while in theory this should work and despite the fact that the gurus (i.e. Sheldon) say it should work, you really just need to try it. If it doesn't work, i.e. the chain rubs on the frame, you need to either punt, or add spacers to the axle on the drive side to get more clearance.

However, this can really become a project. I had to add about 2 mm of spacer, which meant I had to go with a longer axle to get the little axle stubs to be the right length, then I had to re-dish the wheel to center the rim. After all that I have a wheel that is slightly weaker as a result of added dish. Plus this is an iterative cut-and-try process.

The dish issue can be partly mitigated by going to a longer axle and cold-setting the frame for 130 mm. This will let you position the hub in a more centered location and get a bit better spoke angle. One benefit to having a shop do the cold-setting is that they can align the dropouts so they're parallel. This eliminates a flexing stress on the axles. Old-style hubs with longer axles have had a history of axle bending or breakage. That old-fashioned hub needs all the help you can give it.

Variables include chain width, freewheel total build-up, hub shell design, and the clearance available at the attachment between the drive-side seatstay and the dropout. Not all 7-speed freewheels have the same width, in my experience.

Tony Oliver in his great book Touring Bikes says that 5 speed systems with standard spacing need 30.0 mm between the freewheel mount face and the locknut mount face (that presses against the dropout). This 36 mm clearance is a good starting point, but it isn't that easy to measure.

Good luck, and be careful. You also need to have a correct chainline, i.e. the chainset and the freewheel need to be in proper alignment. If not, you could get rubbing sounds, or other funky chain-sprocket noises.

Ken Freeman

Sheldon Brown

You don't? Sure doesn't sound that way! ;-)

That's pretty trivial in my experience. Never went in for football.

No you didn't have to replace the axle.

Typical axles protrude 5.5 mm on each side, which is WAY more than you actually need. A couple of mm is quite sufficient. Indeed, I rode for a long time on a hub where the axle didn't stick out at all...it was flush with the surface of the locknuts. (This was a fixed gear with vertical dropouts, and I did it to permit a bit of chain tension adjustment.) Never gave me a lick of trouble.

The size of the smallest sprocket also gets into it...some frames have clearance limited by the end of the chainsta or seatstay, not by the flat surface of the fork end. The larger the small sprocket, the greater the chance of having interference with the ends of the stays. This can often be solved by a few strokes of a file.

Sheldon "Be Not Afraid" Brown

the beef

It's fine, friction shifting makes it really easy to do those sorts of upgrades. I'm running a 7-speed freewheel on an originally 6-speed bike - the only adjustments I really had to make were in the limit screws.

Road Fan

I really didn't intend to discourage, I intended to convey my experience, doing the job to my bike as I saw it to be needed. I am not a shop mech, I do this in my spare time to my own bikes. If I need parts I have to search for them, buy as seems best, then wait. You, Sheldon, are almost certainly a better mechanic than I. I concede that. But for one reason or another, this job was NOT trivial as you say. Saying it's trivial lulls the amateur into thinking it won't take much time. I'll leave out the football analogies for your benefit, Sheldon, as long as you'll leave out the veiled ridicule of amateurs. I think that's a bad way to run a business, and your response reflects badly on your business.

BTW, I didn't mean to say I needed to replace the axle. I did, however, choose to. You didn't need to build a bike with 9 speeds in the rear and a single chainwheel on the front, but I didn't send you a ciding remark.

I wish I had been more aware of the potential pitfalls before I started this particular upgrade. I might have set up for the job differently than I did. I hope the OP saw my post in the light it was intended, unlike you, Sheldon "be not compassionate" Brown.

Ken Freeman

Road Fan

I left out that Tony Oliver recommended that 36 mm allowance is needed for 6 speeds.

masi61

As others have said you just have to try it. I'm not sure the quality level on a Bianchi Nuovo Allouro frame, but if its more entry level I'd feel more comfortable tweaking it(i.e. cold-setting to 130mm) than if its a perfect Specialissima with chrome dropouts and chrome lugs etc... If you have a real collector's item of a frame like I do (1978 Masi GC California) which comes with like a 125mm rear triangle, I would only use what slides in to the drop-outs the way they are. Depending on the brand of 7 speed freewheel you are using you just might make it without major modifications. I had luck with a SunTour Winner Pro 7 speed fw on my Puch, but no go on the masi. I agree with the points made thus far by both Sheldon and RoadFan, but since I'm not a pro wrench I would advise caution before going to crazy with the modifications. As for myself, I want more cogs on my Masi but I decided to work within the constraints (i.e. 126 rear triangle is a given) and source some freehubs and cassettes that are 126mm from the get-go. Check ebay (regularly) and you might find some rear hub that will be just the ticket. I now have a SunTour MiroLite 7 speed freehub with 2 new Powerflow 7 speed cassettes that I intend to build up into a wheel to try with SunTour indexing shift levers, and I also have purchased from Banana Brain (haven't gotten yet) a Shimano 600 Ultegra 126 mm 7 speed Uniglide freehub and also purchased 2 Uniglide nos cassettes 7 speed from a different vendor. I plan to post some updates here as I bring together these (2) separate wheel builds.
Let us know more about your Bianchi and what you found out when you tried the 7 speed freewheel, O.K.? By the way, one of the best biketool investments you can make is a set of metric dial calipers. I have nylon ones that were $20, but you can get machinist grade ones from stainless steel for not much more $$. I use mine ALL the time, they really eliminate guesswork.

lotek 

look for a Suntour Ultra 7 freewheel?

marty

John E

My Bianchi, of essentially your vintage, has 126mm dropout spacing and came with a 6-speed 13-23 Regina America freewheel on an Ofmega hub. For several years, I used a 7-speed 13-26 SRAM freewheel on a Japanese hub, without having to cold-set anything. However, when I built up my new/old wheelset with period-correct Campagnolo Gran Sport hubs (and 126mm spacing), I found that I the chain would not clear the dropout with the SRAM freewheel, so I am back to 6 speeds, with a standard-width (non "ultra") 14-26 SunTour. If I ever decide I really miss the two additional gear ratios*, I'll respace the axle and redish the wheel.

____
*With 50-42 / 14-16-18-20-23-26, I get a decent 1.5-step ratio progression with an adequate total range, but I sometimes wish I had the 90-inch gear a 14-15-16-18-20-23-26 freewheel would provide.

masi61

I have a wheelset with Campy Record high flange hubs that just barely handles a SIX, so I know that a SEVEN is out of the question. Maybe its a matter of spacers. Guess I'll have to practice what I preach and get out the trusty metric dial calipers and quantify why this is so.

Sheldon Brown

Sorry if I seemed harsh. Giving advice to strangers is always a bit of a tightrope act, because you don't know the level of competence. You don't want to gloss over real pitfalls, but you don't want to be patronizing and say "turn the wrench clockwise to tighten the nut" all the time either.

"Trivial" is in the mind of the beholder...there are some folks for whom a simple flat tire repair is a big deal, others who have no fear to respoke a wheel or straighten a fork. My general approach is to demystify as much as possible, and encourage folks to try things.

In going from a regular 6-speed to a 7-speed freewheel, it would be prudent to have some axle washers on hand to start with, but even if you don't, it's not as if a clearance problem would render the bike unrideable, though it might temporarily render the smallest sprocket unusable.

I did take issue with your statement that you "had to go with a longer axle." I do not believe that was correct, and your stating that this was necessary could indeed deter a competent cyclist from attempting this upgrade.

Sorry, I'm not a mind reader, I can only go by what you post, not by your hidden meaning.

Huh? Whazzatabout? ;-)

What pitfalls were those aside from the noted need to add a spacer or two and maybe slightly re-dish the wheel?

Sheldon "Don't Make It Seem Harder Than It Is" Brown

Road Fan

I had somehow got the idea that "any" narrow 7 would fit in the space of any standard 6 with adequate chain clearance. Indeed, it did work that easy for me on my Trek 610, Mondonico, and Masi GC, at least with some FWs. On my Woodrup Giro, I had chain rub on the inner surface of the seatstay. It was rideable but irritating. I like silent bikes, at least limited to chain rustle and singing sewups. I considered a smaller sprocket, but I wanted to move the gear pattern into my range (say 30 inches to 100 inches), not into racer land, so I wanted to stay with teh 13 tooth small cog. I tried several different chains to reduce chain "runout," if that's the right word, but nothing was enough smaller. Had to respace the drive side.

I took apart the axle, and first thing was that the locknut broke in half (old Campy record, it split into two 180 degree halves.) I hunted for a Detroit shop with the part, and found my nut had a 5 mm thickness, and the store that had anything left over had a 6 mm and an 8 mm. I bought it and some spacers and put it all back to gether, guessing I needed 1 mm added clearance. This still rubbed, but not as loud. I added in the next spacer, then took a good look at the tire position in the frame. I didn't like the noticable tire offset, so I thought about dishing. Since I was planning long rides on this bike, perhaps 22 mile commuting I decided not to adjust dish by more than I had to. I added a 1 mm spacer to the left side, which brought OLD up to about 128 or 129 mm. After re-installing, I found the noise was gone, teh wheel still looked out of dish in the frame, and I had stretched the frame a bit to mount the wheel, and the axle end stubs (initially in the 4 mm range, not around 5.5, somewhere along the line I measured) were about gone. At least I didn't like the way it looked. Went back to the phone, found a shop with 136 mm axles (I think), bought, disassembled, reassembled, adjusted the bearing, mounted the freewheel, installed the skewere (whew, the old Super Record fit!) and installed the wheel. Rim was just a bit offset in the frame, so I adjusted the spokes in alternate directions about half a turn each. Then I tweaked for trueness, and went for a ride. Silence and good gear steps! Not worried about chainline because the rear mech limits only needed minor adjustment, and there's no significant chain chunking.

In my terms, I "had" to replace the axle because I wanted the axle stubs to look as they had with the as-original axle. Perhaps it wasn't an absolute necessity.

So, Sheldon, that's the whole story as I recall it. I hope some other rider can benefit from this experience and thought process. Total duration, unfortunately, was about 10 days, compared to perhaps 1.5 hours by a good shop tech in a well-stocked shop.

I'll check the dish carefully next time I peel off the tubular, but I don't feel like fighting with set glue and re-gluing at this point. The bike rides well as it is.

BTW, by my measurements, this old Woodrup has less trail than many modern sport-tourers, like Herons and Rivs. Also the BB height is rather large, around 27.5 cm if I recall right. Makes a bike that stays on the fog line.

Ken

Sheldon Brown

That used to be a big deal to me, but I don't care as much since I got my iPod ;-) That's not to say that I consider chain rub acceptable.

Filing the seatstay a bit might have fixed this, but I understand the reluctance to do this on a collectible frame.

I'm guessing this wasn't the first conversion...coulda been a hub that started life as a 5-speed 120 mm and was subsequently upgraded to 6-speed. I've got one like that on my Rambouillet, with a Shimano 11-34 7-speed freewheel:

https://sheldonbrown.com/rambouillet

Sheldon "All Generalizations Are False" Brown

Road Fan

In going through this I compared all the low-flange Records I have around, and this wheel was different. I think it wasn't set up with Campy's intended 6-speed setting when I got it. I am the n-th owner of this wheel, with n probably greater than 3. She's had a long and useful life.

Ken

roccobike

Sincitycycler, thanks for starting this thread. I'm also in the process of changing from a 6 speed to a 7 speed rear, but I'm also changing from friction to index. I've already changed the shifters (Suntour for Suntour accushift) and the shifters work great with the 6 speed rear. My next move is to buy the 7 speed rear and install it. Thanks again.