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Permalink Reply by Bailey Gene Newbrey on July 27, 2011 at 4:46pm

I teach 5th-graders how to do it. & again, the Shimano cones keep grime out amazingly well. Comparable to old Campy. When someone refers to a sealed bearing as "blown out" it means that your hub is loose. The bearing is broken.

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Permalink Reply by J on July 28, 2011 at 1:39am

My shop builds hundreds of wheels each year, most of them with sealed bearings, and about half of those specifically using the Velocity hubs. The relative merits of the two systems have been covered, but I'll point this out:

 

Velocity is distributed out of Michigan, and has a fantastic service and warranty department. Also, all of their hubs have easily replaceable, standard bearings. So even if you do eventually wear them out, you're looking at about $10-20 in parts. 

 

One important difference to consider... if you wear out sealed bearing units, and continue to ride them... the bearings will suffer, but the hub shell will not be damaged. On the other hand, if you do the same thing with a cup and cone design (which we see all the time)... you risk pitting and permanently damaging she shell. The Shimano hubs are great for sure, just don't forget to maintain them regularly.

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Permalink Reply by Far'arned Retrogrumpalunkus #63 on July 28, 2011 at 2:24am

I've found that if one goes to a bearing wholesale distributor shop they can often source standard bearings at a MUCH lower price than what a vehicle/tool/equipment/OEM-specific dealer selling them would charge.  It's just a matter of finding out where a wholesale bearing shop that will sell individual bearings to a walk-in customer might be in town. I'm sure there is one in a big city like this  There were a couple in Madison that I used to frequent back in the day.

 

Coming from the motorcycle world a wheel bearing might be $30+ each at a Honda/Yamaha/Kawasaki dealership while that exact same bearing would be $10-12 at a bearing shop and often would be fully sealed while the OEM-specified part would usually be a cheaper unit with the dust seal only on one side -if at all.

 

I'm pretty sure this would be the case for most all higher-production bicycle sealed bearings as well.  These guys are not producing their own bearings but buying something off the shelf from a large bearing maker someplace out in the pacific rim. 

 

Back to loose ball, the nice thing about them is that a bag of 144 usually runs about $4-5 online -which works out to be about $.03-.05 each.  Using the TEN acronym rule that usually puts Ten bearings in a front wheel on each side and Nine in a rear wheel on each side.  That's less than a buck to replace all the balls for new and a 1qt tub of grease runs about $5 an auto parts store.  One can get about 500 wheels greased with that tub so that works out to about a penny a wheel in grease.    

 

So a sealed bearing costs $10-20 to rebuild a wheel and a loose ball wheel costs about a buck.   It's not even worth cleaning dirty balls as the replacements are pretty cheap -unless you are spending big dollars on super nice high-grade bearings which really aren't that necessary on a bicycle wheel. 

 

It's a 10-20 minute job to rebuild a loose-ball hub depending on how anal one wants to get about cleaning out the old grease from the hub and the cones.  If one just wanted to half-ass wipe out the old grease with a quick rub with a towel the job could probably be done in 4-5 minutes if you were really in a hurry.  Putting the bike on the stand and removing the wheel before putting into the axle vise takes as long as doing the job.  

 

Having your stash of new bearings organized and handy makes the job quicker too.  Going to an LBS to buy them isn't a hardship but it's a real time-waster.  Whenever one of my jars of loose ball bearings gets under about 50-60 I am sure to put a new bag of 144 in my Amazon shopping cart.  I've always got a jar of each:  5/16" , 3/32", & 1/4" right in the bottom of my tool box ready to go.  I work mostly on old 3-speeds so those pretty much cover the gamut of what I need.   I really need to be careful with the 5/32" supply on hand as a Nottingham/Raleigh headset contains 25 balls each top and bottom for a total of 50 balls which really eats up the supply quickly if I am busy. 

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Permalink Reply by Brendan Kevenides on July 28, 2011 at 3:00am

Thanks.  That's some very helpful info regarding Velocity hubs.

J said:

My shop builds hundreds of wheels each year, most of them with sealed bearings, and about half of those specifically using the Velocity hubs. The relative merits of the two systems have been covered, but I'll point this out:

 

Velocity is distributed out of Michigan, and has a fantastic service and warranty department. Also, all of their hubs have easily replaceable, standard bearings. So even if you do eventually wear them out, you're looking at about $10-20 in parts. 

 

One important difference to consider... if you wear out sealed bearing units, and continue to ride them... the bearings will suffer, but the hub shell will not be damaged. On the other hand, if you do the same thing with a cup and cone design (which we see all the time)... you risk pitting and permanently damaging she shell. The Shimano hubs are great for sure, just don't forget to maintain them regularly.

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Permalink Reply by spacemodular on July 29, 2011 at 4:27am

J & B carries these hubs. The 135mm spaced Tandem hub is branded as "Wheel Master". The Track style hubs are branded as Origin8. These are the same as the Quanta and Quando hubs - same factory, different branding. I find these are the best quality hubs for the least money. I know at least 5 people who have built wheels on these hubs who use them for commuting with zero problems. You can also purchase complete wheels through J & B that use these hubs. These wheels can have Velocity, Sun Ringle or Mavic rims with DT Swiss Stainless spokes. J & B really has turned their wheel building operation around in the last year - 5 machines for $1 million dollars and a robust quality control system all built in Miami. Totally different than before when they had their wheels built overseas with lax quality control - those wheels were crap. Anyway - I like these hubs!

Adam "Cezar" Jenkins said:

I've run both before. I've also overhauled hubs on dozens of bikes. With my latest wheelset I went with sealed. One reason is that there is a brand now called Quanta/Quando. If you can find the cassette version, they are an excellent value. They also use "standard" bearing cartridges, from skateboards IIRC.

 

Everything wears out, but the annoying and frustration of adjusting a hub just got to me after a while. To change a sealed bearing, you pop off the old one and press on a new out.

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Permalink Reply by Brendan Kevenides on July 29, 2011 at 4:35am

Thanks for all of the input.  I decided to go with Velocity Arrowheat Rims with Velocity sealed bearing hubs and DT Swiss double butted spokes with brass nipples.  I can't wait to get 'em.

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Permalink Reply by spacemodular on August 3, 2011 at 4:08pm

Just received a front wheel version of this wheel for a customer today. Damn, those are smooth bearings!

Brendan Kevenides said:

Thanks for all of the input.  I decided to go with Velocity Arrowheat Rims with Velocity sealed bearing hubs and DT Swiss double butted spokes with brass nipples.  I can't wait to get 'em.

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