Anyone replaced the cups on a Shimano hub? Or know of any reasons why not to?

Do you mean the bits in the hub, not the cones that thread on the axle?

The cups are non replaceable. If they’re goosed then its new hub time.

^ + 1

stoner & bigyinn…nope!

If you have the right tools you can bash them out and replace – older campag hubs relied on this (using 3/16″ bearings near the middle of the hub, they had to rely on something).

Entirely feasible to those that know how and those prepared to learn – less to it than bashing out the beloved Hope bearing.

Trouble will be finding/making the tool…

and where do you get deore spare cups? Or do you just machine your own out of a spare spoon? 😉

Bash them out of a cheaply bought hub, silly 🙄

got to be quicker rebuilding the wheel around the cheaply bought hub no?

got to be quicker rebuilding the wheel around the cheaply bought hub no?

….errr, No!

I literally bashed them in, its not hard, but I would recommend you make some kind of press like my headset fitting tool (10 or 12mm threaded bar). If you have a good range of size and lengths of sockets they work well with this.

Not a chance stoner, takes seconds with the right tools.

Of course you have to find an identical hub to ensure everything is compatible – not easy with shimano. You have to not damage the bearing surface fitting it.

I imagine suitably formed dowel drift would work OK then?

Cheers Al, just what I wanted to hear 🙂
Surely people should be doing this more often? And why not make cups available to buy easily? It’s not that differant to changing a headset or press fit bearings.

I snapped an axle in the front hub a while back and bought a full hub off CRC for £10. Only used the axle and bearings so have a fresh hub with new cups sitting around.
Changing the cups looks like an easier job than rebuilding the wheel.

The cup insert has a good rim around it so no need to bash the bearing surface for fitting.

And why not make cups available to buy easily?

Not enough profit for shimano – the whole ethos is for replacement not repair

Yet cones and BB’s are readily available!

Of course you have to find an identical hub to ensure everything is compatible – not easy with shimano. You have to not damage the bearing surface fitting it.

I havent looked too hard at it but cups seem quite standard across the range, and if you have cups/axle/cones/bearings from another hub you can mix/match and use the lot. I have never had a problem, I used cups from a 20yr old non-disc hub into a 5yr old disc hub.

You would have to go some to damage the bearing surface, it being hardended steel and all, but if you are touching the bearing surface you are doing it all wrong anyway.

cones are certainly not standard across the whole shimano range. Not all cones are even available as spares

Do you mean the bits in the hub, not the cones that thread on the axle?

The cups are non replaceable. If they’re goosed then its new hub time.

not true, you can get the races out of the hubs with a bit of effort and a punch

True, and for completely random reasons as far as I can tell! Still, they havent beaten me yet, I have previously used the ‘wrong’ cone and got away with it!

WRT to al and others, how do you ensure the cup surfaces are parallel to each other. Do they just butt up to a shoulder in the hub shell?

Yes, the hub ally is machined with a recess.

in bmx days you could buy new cups. I have looked for cups recently and found nothing.

Surely as long as the cup and cone use the same size of loose ball bearing they should be ok?

Or for old and worn cups and cones, you could use slightly bigger ball bearings which might compensate for the wear.

I have seen this done successfully.

The wear isn’t normally uniform, more likely to be ‘pitting’ and rough. Bigger bearings wouldn’t fix this.

We’re not straying off topic into a ‘who’s got the biggest balls’ argument now are we?

Why do they tend to get that sort of dimply wear pattern instead of just an even ring of wear? Weired Science?

Shame you can’t get a tool to regrind the cups when they are pitted, like when you grind in the valves on a cylinder head. I suppose once the surface has gone they are goosed though.

Taki – I’ve run old rough cups smoother again, cutting/grinding paste would make it even quicker.

TandemJeremy – Member
cones are certainly not standard across the whole shimano range. Not all cones are even available as spares

Much as you would love shimano products to live up to your belief that they are disposable, I am afraid I have to disappoint.

I would love to know which cones are unavailable, which are they? IME (that’s years of working in a shop repairing bikes and often ordering cones and other hub parts) there was no shimano hub for which spare cones were unavailable (of course certain cones could be used in a number of hubs.).

Shame you can’t get a tool to regrind the cups when they are pitted, like when you grind in the valves on a cylinder head. I suppose once the surface has gone they are goosed though.

They used to be case hardened, so once the surface breaks through they wear rapidly. I dunno about modern ones, but if they were through hardened they wouldnt be very tough and quite diffcult to re cut..

Replacement axle assembly here on fleabay £3.50

The only thing that’s important for interchangability is that they physically fit- ie the interference fit into the hubs has to be the same. It’s possible they’re not all the same from Shimano but I’ve never heard of anyone finding a like-for-like set that weren’t. (I put a new set of cups into an ancient Shimano cheapy hub from the mid 90s, the replacements were mid 2000s and were slightly different, in ways that didn’t matter.)

(it doesn’t matter if the cones are the same- the cones are matched to the new cups not the old ones)

Yeap I replaced Hub cups on a pair of XT hubs wheels.
I did try to replace the cones only before the hub cups got bad but can’t find any cones or axles anywhere at the time all out of stock! (even looked up the part number from Shimano website)so rode them into the ground.

Anyway I brought a pair od new XT hubs and swaped every thing over including the rear freehub body. pressing the new hub cups in was hard they are tight, putting the cups in the frezer for a bit helped.
lot quicker that rebuilding a pair of wheels. and wheels still going strong.

Rob