Originally Posted by
LesterOfPuppets
If the bike company made every part of the bike then they might be inclined to share the info but they have product managers that source the parts from different companies. Sometimes parts used on same make/model/year will vary during production run.
They'd probably have to sell a complete manual for $100 or so. Not many people wanna spend that kinda dough on a bike book.
If your bike had Shimano hubs you could check techdocs for info. They don't even give axle thread info but you can surmise it from cone thread info.
http://techdocs.shimano.com/media/te...9830608959.pdf
Now that is pretty good documentation. I doubt it would cost that much to publish documentation because the assembly documentation has to exist somewhere to get the bikes made to specs, the Asian sweat shops don't just wing it or build it from a drawing scribbled on a napkin.
I am leaning to it being purposely being omitted as a favor to bike shops/dealers because if bike shops can't stay open then their sales infrastructure is destroyed, the Raleigh website even says they don't publish the information go to your nearest dealer.
Remember I am looking at this from the point of view of an outsider, not someone who has accepted this practice as just the way it is.