New Rear Wheel shorter axle

[calcheck]

Hi went to nearby Durham bike coop and they replaced my rear wheel for my old Giant Attraction MTB with teeth missing from the cassette for a great price- free. I also learned to dish a wheel since it wasn't the right shape when we took it off their recycle rack. I took it home to my bike but I can't tighten the skewer enough to make the wheel hold onto the rear fork. What can I do now? I had a spare skewer but it was the same size. Can I buy a die for the skewer and make the axle shorter or will that bend my rear forks too much? I'm no lightweight at 215 pounds. John

[GeorgeET]

Hmmm.... Check the axle length on the new wheel and compare to old.. The old skewer worked before and the only change is the wheel. You can swap the axles or convert to bolt on, however lots of different non compatible parts out there.

When you put the new wheel in the rear forks is the axle inset a few mm? Not centered and sticking out on one side?

Check this site for info. and Brown site.

http://sheldonbrown.com/cone-adjustment.html

[calcheck]

Left old wheel at the bike coop for parts I just kept the skewer and it's too short for the deore hub that I got.

[Joe_W]

Ah. How old is your bike? Measure the rear drop out spacing, it is (probably) 130mm. New(er) MTBs and such have 135mm, so the Deore hub might have the 135mm OLD, too. What material is your frame? If it is steel: no worries, you can carefully bend it open. It is only 2.5 mm per side, so the additional stress on the frame is not too bad.
Is the axle maybe too long and sticks out on one (or both) sides? My guess is that the shop did correctly realise this and removed one or two spacers from the axle, leading to the need of redishing the wheel. Now the axle might be a tad too long for the skewer to correctly engage (sticking out on one side). I had briefly thought about shortening the axle but it is hardened steel I think.

Options: Either get the spacers back (at least enough to secure the wheel, 1-2 mm might be enough) or you might be able to get a new(-ish) road wheel. Those have the correct OLD (over locknut distance) of 130mm needed in older MTBs and tourers.

[calcheck]

(09-01-2011, 03:13 AM)Joe_W Wrote:  Ah. How old is your bike? Measure the rear drop out spacing, it is (probably) 130mm. New(er) MTBs and such have 135mm, so the Deore hub might have the 135mm OLD, too. What material is your frame? If it is steel: no worries, you can carefully bend it open. It is only 2.5 mm per side, so the additional stress on the frame is not too bad.
Is the axle maybe too long and sticks out on one (or both) sides? My guess is that the shop did correctly realise this and removed one or two spacers from the axle, leading to the need of redishing the wheel. Now the axle might be a tad too long for the skewer to correctly engage (sticking out on one side). I had briefly thought about shortening the axle but it is hardened steel I think.

Options: Either get the spacers back (at least enough to secure the wheel, 1-2 mm might be enough) or you might be able to get a new(-ish) road wheel. Those have the correct OLD (over locknut distance) of 130mm needed in older MTBs and tourers.

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Hi Joe W.

It is about a '95 model, I didn't have the frame with me I just took the 26" MTB wheel to the shop. I meant to say the skewer is too long, is it OK to compress my frame- it is steel and it seems about an inch smaller although I haven't measured how much new treads I'd have to cut into the skewer. I'm also afraid the skewer will stick out too much and become something to scratch my leg on when I throw my leg over to ride. I meant to check at my local ACE Hardware to see if they have the die- my local bike store closes at 6 and I'm usually tied up till they are closed.

[Joe_W]

Ok, so the axle is not sticking out, it is just the QR skewer that has too few threads! This should be easy: beg a QR skewer off of somebody ;-) if you were in my area I could give you one (I guess), but postage over the pond is higher than the cost of a new one. So you actually have the inverse problem of the common case: The frame is wider than the hub. Now I understand. Sorry for taking so long, I'm not a native speaker (nor - more appropriately - reader). Other idea: putting two additional thin washers on the axle, one on each side (no redishing needed).

[DaveM]

I've never heard of anyone cutting extra threads onto a skewer, though I guess it is possible.
I would also second trying to add washers to the axle rather than finding a shorter skewer. Axle nuts are one thing, but I'm not so sure a QR skewer is strong enough to both compress the frame significantly and hold the wheel it. Better to make the axle wider (across the locknuts). It's ok to use up most of the axle that sticks out of the end.

BTW, it the skewer does stick out too much once you get this all together, you can cut off the extra. Just cut it with the nut already on. Then when you back off the nut it will clear any threads that got mucked up from cutting.

[calcheck]

Well I added 4 large fender washers to the skewer and started tightening it down but the rear fork compression made it so hard to turn the skewer I couldn't tighten it up enough to get it to grab the fork. It looks like I'll need another 4 washers to take up the rest of the slack- I'm worried about putting any inside the frame- I've kept them all on the outside of the frame so the axle sticks a ways out past the fork. Do you think I can put a couple inside too- as long as the axle is at least flush with the frame?

[DaveM]

I think you've got it backwards. The point of the washers is to take up space inside the frame so it doesn't need to be bent in order to tighten on the wheel.

First - A quick release axle should NOT stick out past the outside edge of the drop out (where the axle sits in the frame). The axle should extend a little bit (.25-1.0 cm) past the end of the outermost locknut on the axle on each side. But that extension should not be long enough to go all the way through the drop out and stick out past the outer edge of the frame. If it is, that might be part of why you can't tighten this down.

Ideally, you would take off the outer lock nut on each side of the axle and add the washers under them. Doing this usually means readjusting the bearings on the axle though and you might need cone wrenches you don't have.

Short term, you can just put the washers on the end of the axle. This isn't great, but is probably OK to test out if it will work. It's OK to use up some of the extension of the axle as long as a tiny bit still sticks out the end. Just enough to catch on the frame. But it is really the QR skewer than holds the wheel on.

All this said, if you have to use a large amount of force to clamp the QR skewer down even with the washers, I don't think you should use this wheel. Either you're going to mess up the frame or the skewer's going to break or something else that could cause damage or a crash. If so, measure the frame between the dropouts in the back (inside dimension) and go back and try to get a wheel that will fit.

Also, just to make sure...You know that the quick release does not work like a wing nut, right? You don't just spin it until it tightens down. A very common mistake. See here: http://bikeride.com/remove-install-wheels/