have a bulb hub with a mis-behaving free wheel which is sticking – couldn’t seem to find a video of how likely i am to end up with a big pile of springs/cogs if i try to service it….anyone serviced one of these? any special tools needed?
cheers in advance
paul

Just a common sense wrench.

No tools required. I think the end caps pull off, then the freehub body, then clean it out. If you’ve snapped a spring, you can always make a new one yourself out of some coiled wire. Can be a bit fiddly to put it all back together. I used a piece of ribbon wrapped round the freehub to hold the pawls in place.

Don’t need ribbon, the seal can be slid forward to hold the pawls in place, and will seat itself when you slide the body into the hub.

Nice, I never even considered that!

If you use the seal to hold the pawls in place, there is a danger that it won’t reseat properly.
I usually hold them in whilst pushing the freehub back on and turning it anticlockwise.

I have done a few of these lately so I’ll try and explain.
Remove wheel from bike and remove quick release from wheel.
Use a chain whip and cassette tool to remove the cassette.
Use a tire lever or similar to remove the end cap from the free hub.
Carefully pull off the free hub. If its stiff use a flat screwdriver behind one of the cassette tabs to prize it off ensuring your carefully not to damage anything. Do this somewhere where you will be able to find any bits that fall out e.g. Springs and pawls.
Remove the rubber seal from inside the end of the hub.
Clean the seal and push it back in.
Grease inside the ratchet teeth. Not too much or to thicker grease or the pawls won’t engage or can be slow
Clean the free hub including the cutouts for the pawls.
Clean the pawls and springs.
Put a little grease in the cutouts for the pawls and insert the springs into the holes.
Put the pawls back into the cutouts locating the springs in the holes.
Keeping all the pawls compressed slide the free hub back onto the axle. When you reach the rubber seal turn the free hub anti clockwise whilst pushing the free hub towards the hub to ensure the pawls stay closed.
This may take a couple of attempts on your first hub.
Once the free hub is back in place give it a spin to spread the grease around and check for engagement.
Push the end cap back on.
Put the quick release back in and reinstall the wheel.

Jobs a good un.

Hope this makes sense

Any questions just ask

Andy.

Just have a look at the hope video tutorials.

The seals on a Bulb are a very loose fit in the hubshell(nowhere near as tight as an XC), often coming out with the freehub when you remove it, so it slides back in without problems, but you can give it a prod with a blunt screwdriver just to be sure.