Lateral play in rear wheel, but not at the hub
 

Working on a friend's bike, Surly Crosscheck, one owner, 18 months old, with rear 135 mm Deore hub, enclosed cam skewer, and Alexrims 700c rim. Dropouts are horizontal, with spacing intermediated between 130 and 135.

Rear rim had significant lateral play, relative to frame, with a knocking feeling, like the hub was loose. It had been like this for a couple months before she told me. She can feel it while riding.


What I've tried. And results:

First day:
1) Hub was loose, so we pulled it apart, cleaned everything, inspected cones, races and balls (good), and re-packed. Some of the play was reduced, but it was still there.

A few days later:
2) Replaced skewer with another 135 mm Shimano skewer. Play went away BUT it came back a few days later.

A few days later:
3) Replaced skewer with a 130 mm Shimano skewer, which only engaged a few threads. No change, so went back to the 135 mm skewer.

A few days later:
4) Over-tightened hub to ensure there's absolutely no play there. No change, so re-adjusted hub.

5) Installed my 130 mm road wheel to ensure it's not a frame problem. Play went away; put wheel back in.

6) Ensured axle doesn't protrude past either dropout.

7) Deciding the QR skewer wasn't a factor, I re-installed the original skewer. No change.

Other things I've checked: No broken spokes and no obvious damage to rim (though just realized I didn't look for cracked eyelets).


The last thing I can think of is loose spokes. The NDS do feel a little loose, but not excessively. I have my doubts because there is a distinct knocking feeling when moving the rim. I imagine that loose spokes would cause play, but it'd be smooth and analog. I lost my spoke wrench, so we couldn't try increasing tension on the wheel yesterday, but will soon.


In the meantime, anyone have any ideas?

Shimano freehubs have the freehub body attached to the shell, and the assembly supported on bearings at the ends. If the freehub-hubshell connection is loose it'll present as you describe.

Remove the axle, sirck the big hex hey inside and make sure the internal nut is tight. Or, before you take it fully apart, leave it tight in the frame, push the rim across with decent pressure, and see if you can see deflection behind the cassette (easier to see if the cassette is off). Sometimes you can feel the loose freehub when the cones are backed off slightly.

I had a broken freehub body a while back. It had some weird symptoms like those described. It all becomes obvious when you take the freehub body off, which is really easy to do after you remove the axle. There are vids on youtube which show how to do this.

The inner part of mine was broken in half, it's only obvious once you remove it from the hub.

Makes sense.

If a part inside the freehub is broken as unterhausen mentioned, what would it be and could it be replaced?

If the freehub is bad, you replace it as a module. However it might be OK, just loose from the hub shell, so take it one step at a time.

Thanks both of you. Freehub body was loose; after tightening everything felt secure.

I have similar motion on new to me, used Zipp101 rear wheel. I had to open the release on the rear brake to keep it from hitting when ever I put power into the pedals. I can move the wheel laterally from brake pad to brake pad. Just had the wheel tured & tensioned with the freehub off, so will have to look at the bearings too. Where do you look in the casette or free hub to see if anything is broken? Thanks, Andy

Check the cups in the hub and freehub , One may have come loses . The only fix is to replace the freehub or hub depending on which side it is . other possibility is the axle itself is crack or broken .

Do you mean you trued and tensioned with the cassette off?

In case you haven't seen this: http://www.parktool.com/blog/repair-...b-service#zipp

There are two basic designs for freehubs.

1- Shimano system -- the self-contained freehub module is fixed to the hub shell and the assembly is supported on beatings at each end. Shimano, and most Taiwan-made analogs are this design, and can cause a loose or wobbly wheel if the connection between the two is loose. Usually they're attached via a hex key nut (12mm or larger) accessed fron the end when the axle is removed.

Check for the problem by wiggling the rim while looking behind the freehub body (remove cassette for better view) for movement at the freehub/hub gap.

2- the Hugi/Campagnolo/Mavic system wherein the hub spins on it's own bearings, and the freehub body on another pair of bearings (for bearings total), and the two are connected only via the clutch (ratchet). Here, a probale with the freehub wouldn't affect the hub (and vice versa), so a loose wheel is caused either by bad or misadjusted bearings.

I gave you the overall picture so you can use your own skills to figure yours out, and also because I don't know offhand which design Zipp uses.

Thanks for the replies. Yes I meant with the cassette off. I took the wheels when I first got them to a LBS and the mechanic trued and retensioned the spokes on a truing stand. While I do like to do a lot of the maintaince wrenching, I know truing is not in my skill set. This is a Shimano set up. I had not seem the link JiveTurkey included, thanks for that, too. Andy

A third of the way into the OP I figured: loose sleeve nut holding the cassette body on.

Was I right?

/checks

Edit: Yay me.