Raleigh Rear Wheel
What an embarrassment. I cannot get the rear wheel back in my 1980 Raleigh 3 Speed.
Without warning, the rear wheel slipped forward and jammed in the chain stays. I managed to reset the wheel, and tightened it back up. It was a pain, as everything was gobbed up with grease and dirt, and tightening the non-drive side seemed to cause the whole axle to spin. Anyway, it rode fine.
A week later, the wheel slipped and bound up again. Tightening it back up, I thought I had cross-threaded the non-drive side. Frustrated, I took the wheel upstairs and cleaned it thoroughly.
Once it was clean, I had a close look and the threads looked ok. Sure enough, the axle nut threaded right on. The threads are fine. A googling made reference to washers next to the axle nuts, which mine did not have. Also, I could see that the axle has flats on it to hold it still.
So, I fussed with it again. I managed to get the drive side in and tighten-able, but not the non-drive side. If I can squeeze the drop outs together enough to get the axle nuts started, the non-drive side kind of "snaps" each turn and will not tighten very much. The non-drive side simply will not tighten. I switched axle nuts back and forth, no change.
If I hadn't seen the wheel come off the bike, I'd assume they didn't fit together. It's the weirdest thing.
Any advice?