rgvg

Could be useful if you have one. Or just curious. It's in french but you can turn on subtitles with english translations.

bulgie 

The vid was OK, but disappointing that they didn't replace the bearings. Tear-down and re-grease (keeping the existing bearings) is a common task, so it's good that they covered that. But you don't really need a video for that, it's pretty straightforward.

If you open it up and find a pitted cone or cup* and need to replace it, the parts are available and the job is possible, but a lot harder. The cups are pressed into the hub shell and it's hard to get a tool in behind them to knock them out. Heat on the shell helps, due to aluminum expanding more with heat, which loosens the press fit.

Getting the cone off the fixed side of the axle is also hard, a press fit with no way to get behind it. I have done it by sacrificing the thin "baffle" washer, which is half of the labyrinth seal. Not a problem since I had replacement washers, but I don't know how you'd get that cone off if you had to save the washer. Maybe some specialized tool could be made, a collet perhaps, to grab the cone strongly enough to pull it off, but the harder you clamp down on it with your tool the more tightly it grips the axle. I think the tool would have to grip down in the groove where the balls run, which will require high precision in making the tool, and it probably will need to be hardened (heat-treated).

* yes I know they aren't really cups and cones, but I will use that terminology to keep it simple. Y'all know what I mean, right?

Has anyone followed up on the links to the two places where they said you could find instructions? Do they go into how to extract the cups and the fixed cone?

Bicycle Quarterly had an article about it, maybe back when it was called Vintage Bicycle Quarterly. I have it, but I'm not at home to look at it now and I don't remember whether they went into bearing replacement. I seem to remember Jan saying something along the lines that bearing replacement is so unlikely, because the bearings last such a long time. But I definitely had a pitted one that needed replacing, and I've only had maybe a dozen Maxi Cars open, so one pitted one out of that small sample size isn't what I'd call minuscule. It can happen.

The reason I've had so many apart is that I worked in two shops that sold a lot of them and spec'd them on our custom bikes. I also have several sets of Maxi-Car wheels currently and occasionally move them from one bike to another, or customize the hub width for different freewheel widths (5-6-7-sp). I tinker.

My '58 Follis came with '50s Maxi-Car wheels but I couldn't keep them, because they are so sought-after by collectors and I needed the money. I got an insane amount for them, from a collector in Japan. That bike later got Maxi-Car wheels again, but '70s vintage, not quite so insanely collectible. I can never afford an old bike where all the parts are period-correct, that's for people more well-heeled than myself!

Bad Lag

I'd never before seen the "button hole" spoke holes. I'm surprised everyone doesn't do that on their rear hubs.

bulgie 

Yes and Fun Fact, they are arranged such that you use the same length of spoke for both sides of the rear, and the front too. Why doesn't everyone do that?!?

rgvg

There are links in the video description I think. These ones (though again, in French. Your browser should be able to translate - at least Chrome can) though I'm not sure if they have the detail you are looking for.

https://bike-cafe.fr/2015/06/maxi-ca...moyeu-vintage/

https://www.muzarde.com/reconditionn...oyeu-maxi-car/

bulgie 

Thanks for the links. I didn't see any bearing replacement advice on the first one, but I can't say I studied it carefully.
But the second link goes into it in detail. Showing exactly how to heat the aluminum shell to get the steel races out = just how I did it.
Then they gave me the key to getting the fixed "cone" off the axle without harming the labyrinth seal: cut it off with a tiny abrasive cut-off wheel in a Dremel. Why didn't I think of that?

So thanks again, now I look forward to the next time I need to replace a magneto bearing in a MaxiCar. If I live that long!