[CyclingJunkie]

After servicing my rear King ISO Disc hub I am having trouble reassembling the RingDrive mechanism. Specifically, I cannot press the driven ring back into the hub shell by hand and I don't want to force it for fear of buggering up the splines. This seems so obvious; make sure everything is clean, line up the splines and push it in by hand. I called King and they confirmed that this part should be a "press fit" and should go in by hand.

I can't see any burrs on any of the splines that might be causing this to hang up.

Has anyone else had trouble pushing this part back in by hand? What did you do?
Thanks for any help.

-Dave

 

[COMMITTED]

After servicing my rear King ISO Disc hub I am having trouble reassembling the RingDrive mechanism. Specifically, I cannot press the driven ring back into the hub shell by hand and I don't want to force it for fear of buggering up the splines. This seems so obvious; make sure everything is clean, line up the splines and push it in by hand. I called King and they confirmed that this part should be a "press fit" and should go in by hand.

I can't see any burrs on any of the splines that might be causing this to hang up.

Has anyone else had trouble pushing this part back in by hand? What did you do?
Thanks for any help.

-Dave

CK has a video of this on their web site www.chrisking.com. I just looked at it and the ring drives should just drop right into the shell, followed by the bearings.

 

[CyclingJunkie]

Now I am really frustrated. I have the Technical Service Manual that clearly shows how it should go back together and now I have watched the video. My drive ring drops into place nicely but the driven ring gets stuck. In the video the driven ring didn't even require a "press fit", it just dropped into place.

Thanks for the heads up on the video.

 

[tscheezy]

Is the ring drive (the thing inside the hub shell) sort of loose and floaty? It should be able to move easily and sort of swim in the groove it lives in with a little resistance from a light spring. If it is sitting crooked or something (wedged somehow) that could cause binding. That is really the only thing that comes to mind...

 

[steiny]

Try putting the driven ring in by itself

Take out the spring retainer, spring, and drive ring. Just try sliding the driven ring in by itself - nothing else in that end of the hub shell. It should just slide right in and bottom at the appropriate place. Make sure the O-ring on the driven ring is properly seated in the groove. Make sure you are inserting the driven ring with the engagement teeth face down (into the hub). Trying to insert the driven ring with the engagement teeth facing outward will cause it to hang up.

 

[COMMITTED]

Take out the spring retainer, spring, and drive ring. Just try sliding the driven ring in by itself - nothing else in that end of the hub shell. It should just slide right in and bottom at the appropriate place. Make sure the O-ring on the driven ring is properly seated in the groove. Make sure you are inserting the driven ring with the engagement teeth face down (into the hub). Trying to insert the driven ring with the engagement teeth facing outward will cause it to hang up.

Let us know when you get this figured out what the problem was. I'd like to avoid the same issue when I tear mine down for it's first clean n' lube. Thanks

 

[CyclingJunkie]

Still struggling with this one but thanks for the suggestions so far. The spring retainer, spring, and drive ring fall into place perfectly. The drive ring sits flat on the spring and has no binding at all when I move it up and down on the spring so I don't think that is an issue.

Following good suggestion that I try installing without the other parts in place, I removed the retainer, spring and drive ring from the hub shell and double-checked the o-ring that is on the driven ring. I still can't get the driven to drop into the hub shell.

It is as if the splines are messed up and the splines on the driven ring are not meshing with the splines on the hub shell but I can't see any burrs or other problems.

I am thinking about sending it into King at this point.

 

[steiny]

Do you have access to machinist tools?

If you have access to either dial calipers or a telescoping guage and micrometer, you should check the bearing bore on the drive side to make sure it is round. Assuming there are no burrs, dirt, or other foreign objects clogging either splines on either mating surface, the only reasonable explanation I can think of is that the bore is out of round enough that the driven ring won't go back in.

In one of Chris King's manuals it mentions that some guys built their wheels with such high spoke tension that the hub flange is actually stetched so that the stock bearings actually fall out of the bore. To fix that particular situation, King stocks oversized bearings that they can fit into the enlarged bore. I've never head this before and this is just a guess on my part, but what if you have just a few spokes that are super tight on the drive side (and/or maybe a few that are really loose on the drive side) - maybe that makes the shell slightly eggy? While the guts are in, everything probably works OK. Pull them out, the hub is elongated slightly (we're talking 0.0002 - 0.0004" here - not detectable by the eye) and now you can't get the driven ring back in - and maybe not the drive side bearing either without beating it to death ?

I'd just perform a sanity check on your spoke tension and make sure you don't have any broken spokes, noodle loose spokes, or spokes so tight you can't even get any deflection out of them. Correcting the spoke tension may allow you to get the driven ring in. If nothing obvious jumps out at you as far as the spokes go, it's probably time to ship it back to King and let them look at it. They'll take care of it and get you rolling again for sure.

Let us know how this all winds up.

 

[CyclingJunkie]

Another excellent suggestion that I would not have thought of. I am no wheel builder but all of the spokes seem to have even tension on them and there are none that are obviously loose. In fact this wheel has stayed true since I had it built last May. Unfortunately I don't have access to any machinists tools either so I guess it is going back to King today. I will post the outcome when it gets resolved. Thanks for the help.

 

[CyclingJunkie]

Final attempt = Success!!

I decided to give this one more effort before boxing the wheel up so I called King to see if there was anything I might be overlooking. David at King was very helpful and patient. He suggested thoroughly inspecting both sets of splines one more time.

The problem ended up being the splines inside the hub shell. In my effort to push the driven ring back in, I had deformed (mushroomed) the top of the splines a tiny bit...and I am talking tiny bit. It was so minimal that I couldn't see anything "wrong" when looking into the hub but it was preventing the driven ring from dropping in.

My solution was to first put a black dot at the top of one spline to mark my starting point. Then I used an awl to carefully re-open the top of each and every spline. I couldn't see OR feel that I was actually doing anything but it was enough to allow the driven ring to drop into place with minimal thumb pressure. Woohoo!

The moral is; Don't do what I did! Do not try to force the driven ring into place even with thumb pressure. If the splines are not lined up perfectly and you push too hard you will deform the hub shell splines.

 

[steiny]

Good deal

Now get that hub buttoned up and get that bike dirty.