Well, hello everyone this is my first post.
I have been trying to renovate an old road bike a British hercules. The thing is that the bike has old components and I have trouble finding other ones. I want to keep the front chainring 48t but remove the internal hub that my gramp was using. Instead i decided to buy a nice wheel with a 9 cassette and the suitable deraileur. Well my main problem is...Will this fit with the 48t chainring? Is the deraileur going to be ok with the claw type hanger (the bike has no built-in hanger)? In copenhagen where I live we have no steep hills, everything is basically so flat it ends up boring...what do you suggest?
Thanks!
Ps. The bike was originally with a 6 gear cassette and an old simplex deraileur! But these ancient parts of mine are in very bad shape...
The front chainring is likely built for an 1/8 inch chain, all cassettes require 3/32, so the combo will not work. Also you would have to spread the rear dropouts to fit in a modern multispeed hub. Terrible thing in my view to do to a classic 3 speed.
Welcome, I just recently joined myself. A British Hercules is like a 3 speed Raliegh?
I would second what cny-man said.
Fix it up as a classic 3 speed. You will save yourself a big headache.
"Where ever we go, there we are"
If you want a multispeed bike then spiff up the Herc and sell it, buy what you want instead of spending much more to cobble together something.
The bike is not a classical 3 gear. My grandpa put on an internal shimano nexus for riding it when the old deraileur was too damaged. Now it has a 3 gear shimano nexus. The initial shifter is a down tube huret counting up to 6 which basically means that the old cassette had six gears.
PS. My hub spacing is 120mm on the back end of the frame. So I guess a 7 gear shimano HG cassette will fit. Still the problem remains the same. With an open dropout and a claw hanger what deraileur can be used so I have no problems?
The additional info changes things, of course. Sounds like quite a few changes were already made. However 126 is standard 7 speed road spacing, so still not wide enough, and you still need to confirm that a 3/32 (narrow) chain will fit.
OK, now that you've provided more info it appears you can go ahead, but the lever you use (if you want indexing) is the critical item - any claw mount Shimano index compatible road derailleur will work.
thank you very much dude for the replying and the guidance. The frame is CrMo so it appears to be elastic enough to fit a 126 hub. I have also found a pair of wheels with freewheel compatible hub coming in both 120 and 126mm I ll buy the latter and try it with a 7 gear freewheel cassette.
Ps. About indexing....I like the retro style of the bike, I think I am keeping the old friction shifter... It has numbers but not predefined positions for gears..
Thanks again!
Hmm really thanks for everything Nigel, I appreciate the help and the useful info. The wheels are (sorry for my language) crap. Basically the whole bike is in a mess. I can upload some pictures but they are not really worth salvaging anything. The wheels as I was said they were taken from an old supermarket-type bike (at least the front one). The back wheel is bended in an irrepairable way from the latest accident the grandpa had with this bike. To be honest ONLY the frame is worth keeping because I love it so much (even though one can find it in the german ebay for 200euros in a lot better condition). This, that you've said changes everything. I can't trust myself to build a wheel I ve done it only twice and I would like to have something better than my own inexperienced wheel-building. I found a rod though, to expand a bit the frame spacing. I have seen a friend doing it I will do it till it reaches 130mm. The frame is CrMo and I have nothing to lose anyway except an old frame in the worst case scenario. Then we can easily talk about 130mm hub wheel that could take a normal cassette. I like that more I think..in this way I can bring new life to the old herc and make it a bit more modern too.
well poor bike... it seems I 've got another headache too on top of everything. The old seat binder is bent. And it's not because of some accident or overtightening but its not the original. Although the clumsy mechanic grandpa of mine has managed to keep the seat in place with a random screw and a bolt this has to be changed too. It's rusty and not good. Any ideas on where can someone find these things because all LBS around have been laughing at me and advising to throw the old bike. As for the last part of the frame you can see its condition on the photos. Thanks again!
frame end and seat binder of the bike.
The binder bolt is easy - cut it off with a motor tool like a Dremel with a cut-off wheel.
Next, with the seat post removed, file the opening such that there will be 1 to 2 mm opening left when the binder is clamped on the correct sized seat post.
For a binder bolt, get a class 10.9 or 12.9 M6 bolt and nut, and the two spherical washer sets from a V-brake brake pad. Put one spherical washer set on each side of the binder, bolt the whole assembly together. The spherical washer sets remove any bending stress on the bolt.
Regarding spreading the frame - you have to over spread it by quite a bit. Spread, then remove the tool, measure, spread, measure..... On my SR (Tange CrMo plain guage through out) it had to be spread to about 150-160mm to relax to 135mm.
Nigel