a Shed in Ryde

Over the last holidays I changed the front discs on the cruiser with the help of my son Tom. He took almost all of the pics in the post. Hopefully the following will give you a bit of an idea on the process involved. Remember, I am not a mechanic and you should not try this at home.

The first thing to do is loosen the wheel nuts! Tom is loosening the wheel nuts, bless him! We also loosened the nuts and bolts holding the freewheeling hub assembly together as it is easier to do this when the wheel is not turning.

We also marked (with whiteout) where the different parts line up before we pulled them a part. Perhaps it does not matter how they go back together, but I was not going to take the chance! We will be working our way from the outside in, taking it apart one bit at a time!

 

 

 

In case you were not quite up to speed, the front discs are the disc brakes. Why am I replacing them? Two reasons. Firstly, my mechanic (hi Tony) tells me these have worn so that they are now too thin to machine. Secondly, these ones are warped which results in a pulsing sensation through the break pedal when breaking. Below is a shot of one new disc and one of the discs we removed. Shiny!

So, after loosening all the nuts, we jack the cruiser up remembering safety first. We positioned jackstands to make sure that we were safe working under the big lump of metal we call cruiser.

With the wheel off the next thing is to remove the break calipers (two bolts on the inside side of the calipers). Once this has been removed it can be swung up out of the way and held in place with a piece of tie wire.

After the break caliper is out of the way and secure we can focus on taking apart the freewheeling hub assembly (not sure if that is the official name…).

The locking hub turning thingy will slide out when the bolts are removed. There is a gasket so be careful. Prepare to get greasy!

With the locking hub thingy out of the way you will need to remove a circlip inside on the spindle so that you can pull the next part off. This was a bit tricky, though getting the circlip back on is a whole other thing again!

 

 

 

 

Once the circlip is gone…

Now we are faced with two locking nuts on the spindle (with a locking plate thingy in between the two nuts). If these are really tight (they should not be too tight) and you do not have the proper tool (who does), then use a cold chisel to loosen the nut until you can remove it by hand.

This is what the locking nut looks like with all of it’s greasy goodness. Once you have removed the locking nuts the whole disc/hub assembly will slide towards you, off the spindle. Careful – it is heavy!

Once the hub and disc are removed from the spindle they need to be seperated. The disc is attached to the hub by two bolts that are easily removed while holding the disc in a vice. Not sure if this is good for the disc, but my discs are stuffed anyway…

 

 

 

Apart from the two bolts there are also the 6 wheel studs that pass through the disc and bite into the hub. These need to be pushed back through. I used them again, but to make sure you do not damage them first put a nut over the top. Then you can beat the living daylights out of it with a big hammer until they come back through. Tom has supplied an action shot of the mallet coming down on the stud. Sorry if it is a bit blurry – but it is an action shot!

We also have a shot of some of the studs once they were removed. When you assemble the new disc with the old hub these are going to need to bite back into the old hub. If not, then you run the risk of them turning when you are trying to tighten or loosen your wheel nuts. So, make sure they are in good nic so they can do the job. Otherwise, go and buy some replacements.

 

 

 

 

Even though you have removed the two bolts and the six studs the hub and the disc will still probably be locked together tight. They appear to be a light press fit. I persuaded them to part ways by resting the head of a wooden mallet on the back of the hub and hitting it with a hammer until the two parted company. Exciting stuff.

After you have seperated the two you can start putting things back together. The new disc and the hub can be assembled and locked together with the two bolts before you reinsert the 6 studs and make sure they are securely fitted (drive em home with a mallet and a big punch).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You are now ready to put the hub/disc assembly back on the spindle. This is a good time to check bearing and pack some more grease in etc.

Put everything back together making sure you tighten the locking nuts so they take up the slack but are not too tight (hub should rotate smoothly and easily). Re-attach the brake calipers. The disc suppliers inform me you should always replace the disc pads when installing new discs. You should also allow 200-300 kms before heavy braking so the pads bed into the new discs. This seems dumb as I have probably driven 200-300 kms without even applying brakes!

Happy braking!