buddiiee 

Need a little history help. I'm currently running a Suntour Winner 5 speed rear freewheel on my Record hubs on this old Jeunet, and with my calipers I measure the widest points of my freewheel at 30.2mm, though, I measured my rear hubs at the locknut width and came up with 127, though the closest to this is Sheldon Brown's measurement of 126, and he calls this a 6 or 7 speed rear spacing; not on my frame it's not. This is why I'm confused. Either the chain Sheldon's using is super thin allowing for SUPER thin spacers on his cogs, or he fat fingered something lol. So with my freewheel width of 30.2mm's, would anyone else know of any twist tooth Shimano 5 speed cassette that would fit in this space? I'd like to give one of those a try.

Secondly, anyone know the biggest cog a Dura Ace freewheel goes up to? I was looking for a 26 but could only find a max of 25. Thanks guys.

Bill Kapaun

It looks like an assortment of new spacers on the DS? Maybe an extra 6mm's worth?

Sheldon says a 5 speed cluster is 24mm.
https://www.sheldonbrown.com/cribsheet-spacing.html

mitchmellow62

SheldonBrown.com notes that the 24 mm is sprockets only. It also notes the sprockets are 2 mm thick and the spacers are 3.5 mm thick giving a center to center sprocket distance of 5.5 mm. Yours? 30.2 mm is greater than the total sprockets distance of a regular 6 speed freewheel (29.5).

buddiiee 

This is what I'm not getting; any closer to the inside of the seat stay and the chain would be rubbing. These hubs are old; I've always thought they predated all that 3,845 speed sillyness. I have an old 6 speed freewheel here and tried it on and sure enough, chain hits the seat stay. That's why I'm lost, say what you will, but this spacing is just perfect for my old 5 speed freewheel. Just enough room on both sides to make everything work. I'm soo confused lol.

CliffordK

I never measure anything.

Screw on the freewheel.

Set the spacers to be wide enough on the freewheel side, with all the other spacers on the non-drive side. Set so it easily slides between your dropouts. Not too narrow, not too wide.

trainman999

buddiiee 30.2 is the measurment of the winner body, you can assemble a 5 cog stack at 24.5 mm, an ultra 6 cog stack at 26.5 mm, a regular 6 at 30.4 mm, or a seven cog stack at 31.7 mm, with the right cogs and spacers on this body
126 rear spacing is enough for 7 speeds. In your wheel someone has optomised it for a five speed by moving washers or spacers from the drive side to the non drive side and probbly re dished the wheel. Any 5-6-7 speed freewheel will work for you provided the largest cog does not exced the dreailleur capacity, and you move the washers or spacers back, and redish the wheel.

buddiiee 

I see! My LBS laced this wheel for me when I brought them the components. It was a long time ago but I probably told them I was using a 5 speed because that's what I've always used so that makes sense. Yea, that's why I was confused; I realize the actual space is there for six speeds but never considered re-dishing this wheel, which is why moving spacers around wasn't an option in my mind. So, the way it sits now, I was right, it really can only take five speeds. I get it :0) The people here were speaking in overall total possibilities which I never considered. Ok I'm on track now. If I were ever to want 6 speeds I'd need a re-dish. Got it. Thank you.

BobFishell

5-speed freewheels are hard to find. If you want to go to a 6- or 7-speed freewheel, I'd recommend putting a 2mm axle spacer on the drive side, shorten the non-drive side by the same amount, and re-dish the wheel.

masi61

Looking at your picture it appears that the point of axle exposure is bordering on too much on the drive side. You might get away with just adding in one spacer of, say -2.0 mm and see if this would permit clearance for your 6 speed freewheel.
If you are wanting to try “twist tooth” freewheel design, then you’re talking Uniglide, Shimano’s precursor to today’s highly engineered Hyperglide. Used Uniglide 7-speed Dura Ace freewheels come up all the time on eBay (MF-7400). The ones with 26 tooth low cog sell faster than the racing ones with like 12-23 or 12-21. If you pick up the racing combo one cheap, some eBay sellers sell the individual cogs so you could fit the 26 tooth cog or a 28 or even a 30 tooth cog for a touring set up (sorry - I don’t have a specific link in mind of a seller who has new Dura Ace freewheel cogs at good prices, maybe someone here does.)
If your Campy hub is indeed set up with 127 mm spacing then (as others have said) you should be able to run 7 speed without rubbing. You can try to re-dish your wheel yourself to center the rim as you shorten the drive-side spokes and slightly lengthen the non-drive spokes. This is if you have a truing stand and the proper spoke wrench. When I did my Campy wheel this way, I retrofitted the 137mm axle that is used for the 126mm 6/7 speed conversion. The extra 11mm of axle length is to provide ~5.5 mm of axle projection at each locknut which brings the axle just shy of Campy type dropouts for secure quick release skewer operation.
Unfortunately for me - my spoke threads bottomed out when I went to re-dish, and I also had spoke poking out of the end of the nipple on the drive side. My point here is that re-dishing is not always a simple matter of loosening some spokes and tightening others. Sometimes a partial re-lacing job is needed. This isn’t such a bad thing for an older wheel worth saving though because refreshed spoke nipples will give you peace of mind that things have not seized up and the flats on the spoke nipples are not cammed out or corroded badly in place.
Good luck getting this wheel up to speed again.

BTW: I’ve heard some folks say that Uniglide cogs are super fast shifting in friction mode but not so much index mode.
I use a 7400 7-speed Uniglide cassette on my 126mm road frame and have it dialed nicely for indexing. The main thing for me was that the clattery, not quite spot-on shifting I first encountered with my 105sc GS rear derailleur was due to an out of alignment derailleur hanger. Once this was set up correctly, the 7 speed rear shifting indexes just fine. Which makes me quite happy since my 3 x 7 drivetrain allows great gear range without having to cold set the rear triangle to 130mm.

mrrabbit 

Those of you encouraging "winging it" are not really helping the OP, nor mechanics who have to support his stuff in the future.

There's published specs for this - which I've already posted in this forum only a few months ago:


https://www.mrrabbit.net/docs/freewhe...OLD_sizing.pdf


=8-)

fietsbob

past guy used the spacers they had on hand.. lacking a single one to replace them all ..

5 speed frames are 120mm wide , inside.

LesterOfPuppets

+1 on all that axle showing. Might be OK if you run a claw type derailleur but otherwise, that wheel's gonna pull out.

John Nolan 

Thanks for this!

mrrabbit 

You're welcome!

=8-)

buddiiee 

Just for general info, I am a bike mechanic lol. I've grown up working in bike shops. The questions I'm asking are questions that I've forgotten over the years (I've gotten out of road for a little bit and forgot a few things) and just double checking some spacing questions. As for the amount of axle sticking out on the drive side that's because I have an add on derailleur hanger's extra width to contend with so it's not like I'm not squeezing the dropout enough
As far as local bike shops are concerned if I don't have the tool I'll take it there (for ex. the really expensive tools) but other than that I'll NEVER have a lbs touch any of my stuff; they've no clue what they're doing. I've already had a head tube facing job get jacked, and another shop ask me what a "dial caliper" was; yea, no thank you lol. I can build wheels too but I'm just to busy these days with my house

So what I'm confused about is some here say I may have too many spacers on the drive side, but then again I have more than enough space for even a 7 speed. But on my 5 speed my smallest cog is clearanced just right so that the chain doesn't rub the seat stay. But dishing aside, I have zero spacers (except for the cone's locknut washer) on the non drive side and maybe one too many on the drive side, so if I were to remove one spacer from the drive side my chain would hit, and that's on a 5 speed. This is where I'm missing something. How would a 7 speed fit then? I know it's something obvious I'm just missing it

mitchmellow62

More pictures please: free wheel installed off and on the bike; non drive side on and off the bike.

mrrabbit 

I posted a spec document.

Read it.

Answer your own question.

=8-)