Good day, I am rebuilding, general clean and polish, a set of 6 speed 36 hole record hubs. Is, are there, any upgraded bearings that we use? I thought I read somewhere something about bearing upgrade. Best Robert;

Could you post a picture?

If you are talking about 1970s/1980s Record hubs (as used with the Nuovo Record and Super Record gruppos), most (not all!) of them use 3/16 balls on the front hub and 4/16 balls on the rear. Grade is G 25, I think.

you may be thinking of ceramic bearings, but these don't have any practical value for bikes. Grade 25 steel bearings are the standard and plenty good.

Steve in Peoria

Old Record hubs used 7/32" in front, not 3/16".

Nuovo Tipo (usually called just Tipo for short) used 3/16"

Both models used 1/4" in back.

The original Campy bearings might be even finer than grade 25, though I agree grade 25 is good enough.

With most used hubs of unknown provenance, you don't know what balls may have been swapped in over the years, so I wouldn't fret over rescuing the original Campy balls which are likely long gone. Just get grade 25 steel and be happy.

Mark B

Mark is right, I was wrong. Sorry.

What's the rationale for using different-sized balls in the front and back?

Different sized axle, less weight required on the front. I'm not sure to be honest.

Back in the 70s [I've read] Campy ball bearings were only Grade 100, so 25 is plenty good. Though you can find grade 10 balls at a reasonable price. I use G10.

Okay I will take apart identity the bearings and repack, polish up and get two next step. Thanks

I will have to get a picture later, just received in post today

What does it mean in regard to the cone surfaces if you use balls of a different grade?

Grade 25 is the proper grade for replacement balls. Record rear hubs take nine 1/4" balls on each side; Record front hubs take nine 7/32" balls on each side.

Gran Sport ("Tipo") hubs use nine 1/4" balls on each side for the rear, and ten 3/16" balls on each side for the front.

The rear hub carries more load, so larger balls are used. Record hubs were used for professional racing, thus less tolerant of failure, so the front hub uses larger balls than other front hubs.

Nothing, really. As long as you use the proper diameter ball, the cone will be happy. A grade 25 ball will (in principle, at least) be slightly closer tolerance for roundness and therefore run smoother than a grade 100 ball. And grade 25 balls aren't that much more expensive than grade 100 balls.

I am thinking of "Record S-U" hubs as the last evolutionary step of 1980s Record hubs (before C-Record), with both front and rear hubs using 7/32 balls. Am I very much mistaken?

Oh, and C-Record hubs use 7/32 balls on both front and rear, right...?

How about Triomphe?

Thanks for the feedback. Why not just use large balls for both the front and rear then?

Obligatory AC/DC reference:

Ceramicspeed.

just Spin baby

Thanks for that, but I don´t find velobase too reliable a source.

I wish someone had a definitive answer to the grade of Campy bearings in these hubs. Not that it matters much, but I’ve read comments ranging from just ok to very high quality.

According to Sutherland's 6th Edition, the "S - U" Record hubs use nine 7/32" balls in each front race, and C-Record uses ten 3/16" balls in each front race. Triomphe and Victory hubs were cosmetic variations on Gran Sport ("Tipo") hubs and used nine 1/4" balls in each rear race and ten 3/16" balls in each front race. AFAIK, all Campagnolo rear hubs used nine 1/4" balls in each race, including the "S - U" and C-Record versions.

Just to annoy us.

I have heard of people switching out the cup-and-cone setup with cartridge bearings. I have no idea how much (if any) machining is required, what specific parts are required for the conversion, or if the conversion is actually an improvement. Something to poke around the net during your morning coffee time.

No idea how much of a factor this is, but angular-contact cup/cone bearings are more tolerant of misalignment, like you'll get when the axle flexes. We know axles flex in use, a little bit all the time from holding up your weight, but a lot more when hitting bumps. My guess is this flex is what causes axles to break in fatigue.

Is it enough to cause problems with annular cartridge bearings? I dunno. A few brands of hubs came with the same small (10 mm) axles and cartridge bearings; Omas and Avocet come to mind. But most of the cartridge bearing hubs that are known for durability had larger stiffer axles, like Phil Wood, Mavic, Bullseye, Hi-E. Oh I just remembered, Mavic had special angular-contact cartridge bearings so they were adjustable. Maybe cartridges like that are available with a 10 mm ID? Oh right, there's also Maxicar, which used angular-contact cartridges, but not sealed. (The hubs had a labyrinth seal that was not part of the bearing.) I have heard those called "magneto bearings" so maybe they're a stock item.

If you succeed in making the sealed-cartridge conversion, you would get a hub that needs less maintenance, and that might be worth it right there even if the bearings are sub-optimal.

Note, if you get cartridges with a nominal 10 mm ID, they will be a loose fit on a 10 mm axle, because the tops of the threads measure somewhat less than 10 mm. Those Omas and Avocet hubs had "lands" on the axles where the bearings pressed on, sized to be a light press fit on the bearings. That would be hard to achieve with an existing axle, so you might have to make your own. The gap is too small to shim, I think. Without the lands, there will be slop between the axle and bearing that you can't adjust out. Maybe there is some bearing with a slightly smaller ID, sized to be snug on a nominal 10 mm thread?

This is mostly armchair theorizing. I did replace the axle on an Avocet cartridge hub once, using a normal 10 mm axle without lands, and I couldn't get rid of the slop, but I just rode it anyway — it was a junker bike.

Mark B

Velobase has
Triomphe with: "Front Bearing Size/Count 3/16" 9x9"
Victory with: "Front Bearing Size/Count 3/16" 10 x 10"
C-Record with "Front Bearing Size/Count 3/16" 9x9"

The ball sizes match.