Mad Honk 

Tripple Alarmer,
So help me out here... What does Campy, Miche, and the like, do to get the mirror finish on the cones they make? I'm suspecting they are polished in some method to arrive at the finish that they exhibit.
As a golf club technician I have professional training in the grinding and polishing process in standard steel, and in stainless steel. So I am pretty confident in my skills.
Since you are a smithy, what materials do we have to add to the steel to make Damascus knives? Smiles, MH

sd5782 

@Madhonk, those cones look nice! The ones from the hub you sent are factory nice for whatever that is worth. Looking forward to rebuilding this bike properly, or at least for my skill level.

I am also doing a quick going over of the Trek 412 I bought for cheap in the package deal with this Peugeot. Interesting thing on this bike that was mentioned here is that somewhere in its past it had the full compliment of rear wheel bearings minus one. Thought I may have dropped one, but only 8 on each side. 1/4” at least. Front was correct. Most of the bikes I get have never been apart, but this one must have. Sunshine rear hub.

3alarmer 

...Damascus is a patterned steel accomplished by repetitive folding and forge welding of two different steels, then etching and polishing the final result. You can surface harden a that is almost finished, then polish it after the surface hardening process. Polishing doesn't take off much surface, but when something is pitted deeply enough that you need to remove the surface to some depth to get rid of the pits, you may or may not be going past the hardened surface. Which may or may not affect overall longevity in further use. I've never studied it in depth.

I do know that there are a bunch of people on the internet giving instructions on various methods for doing it.

As a lazy person by conviction, I just toss pitted cones. sometimes I even toss hubs. I am probably a bad person.

oneclick 

It's not the going through the case that is the problem, it's that a ball-bearing needs accurate sizing and concentricity as well as a pretty-looking surface. Grade 25 balls are (supposed to be) within one ten-thousandth of an inch of the correct size. When a pit is big enough to see with a 3x or 5x loupe it's deeper than that. To grind a new race as deep as the deepest pit and maintain concentricity and accuracy is NOT something you want to try to do hand-held.

A race that is not the same diameter or is not concentric within that ten-thousandth will mean that some of the balls are not touching the races; they bear zero load at that point. You may only have eight or nine balls in the bearing, lose contact with any of them and the load on the remainder goes up - and so even if there's any case left a ball will soon punch through it.

Mad Honk 

Well folks, I have another bit for those looking for a helicomatic wheel. Pics below. As always: cost of shipping. PM me smiles, MH

hub and intact cassette

Lock ring is ok and the bearings feel smooth

Mavic rim, so it seems to have been rebuilt at some time

sd5782 

I took this UO14 for a ride today in the 40 degree weather and noticed some problems in back. I got a loose chain hanging on top of the chainstay and quite sketchy take up. I thought perhaps it was the simplex RD derailleur tension spring at first. Getting it home, it seems as thought the freewheel doesn’t really want to freewheel very well. I thought I would give you heliocomatic naysayers a chance to gloat a bit.

So, searching a bit reveals another special tool to disassemble the freewheel to get at the bearings. I think I will blast some brake cleaner in there without disassembly first to see what I get. It’s French, so one has to get aquatinted with it I guess.

Vintage_Cyclist

Throw it into the fire!

sd5782 

I had to laugh out loud. I knew the naysayers would have fun. Still, I am going to try to flush it out and douse with some lighter oil. I would have been more apt to junk it except the 13-30 six speed was a really nice useful range. I’m not giving up yet!

dddd

I would run some gear oil through it and leave it horizontal on a rag for a day or three (depending on temperature).
I would then wrap it in a rag and whirl out any remaining oil toward the back side. Just to keep my hub clean.

Maillard hubs of every type were plagued by over-tight factory bearing tension. Early bearing death consistently ensued.
Be sure that some freeplay is felt at the axle before installing the quick-release's full tension (and watch said freeplay go away when the lever is secured).

sd5782 

I worked on this low mileage freewheel a bit and think it is okay now. The freewheel turned stiffly, but it didn’t seem as if it was from the pawls locking it up. The backside has what looks like pin spanner wrench holes in it which allowed a spray nozzle from a can to fit right in. I was able to directly blast some brake cleaner in a hole, and it instantly loosened up. I spent a bit of time spinning and squirting and working both ways so as to exercise the pawls too. Then came the gear oil that went in easily on both ends. Once again spinning and working and then letting sit for a couple hours. As dddd suggested I previously had the bearings ever so slightly loose and put the wheel back on. It spins very very nice and eventually comes to rest with the stock reflector in the spokes at the bottom. Perhaps dried factory grease was in it gumming up the balls making it bind, or maybe some rust was in there too from lots of sitting. I’m not quite throwing in the towel yet, especially as it wears my first wheel build.

mrv 

Just for my edification: when you say 'gear oli', you mean the heavy stuff I put in the rear differential of my old Ford Ranger, right?
thanks.

sd5782 

Yes @mrv that is what I use. I used to keep 30 weight in one oil can and 20-50 in another. Now I have 80-90 gear oil in one instead of the 20-50. Alas, I don’t use enough to get that nostalgic smell like from the yearly driveshaft and trans fluid changes I did for 28 years on my 77 BMW R100/7 that has been gone for 5 years.