Chain seemed to be skipping and checked drivetrain, there was a lot of play in the cassette.

The cassette itself was not loose, it is the actual freehub body that is really loose. I’m supposed to be up at 4.30am to drive to Wales to meet mates to ride, do I need to strip the whole freehub, new bearings, ideas please?

Thanks

New bearings it sounds like

Just check the hub itself especially around spoke drillings as I had one ‘explode’ it started out with similar symptoms of chain skipping and ended up with a loud bang as the hub ripped clean apart. Brilliant Hope service as always though they replaced and rebuilt hub within the week.

Thanks guys.

I had exactly what you are describing happen with mine over the NewYear period.
It was the outer bearing in the freehub body that had gone – there are four in total but it was just the outer one that was shot – my good friend Al at Garage bikes fixed it in next to no time – if you’ve got the bearings to hand its quite possible you can do the job at home

there are four in total

Eh, 3 in the freehub and then 1 either side of the wheel hub.

Just take it off and look, or tbh if I was due out tomorrow, I’d just put another wheel in.

depending just how gubbed the bearing is its unlikely to fail catastrophically on one ride as it will have likely been like that a while

b r – sorry ,I stand corrected , thereare indeed