Laying Down a Rohloff

[morebikes]

I have read that you should not lay a Rohloff hub on its side for to long.
Does anyone know how long is to long and how does this fit with laying it in a tent overnight?

[marcg]

Where did you read that, please?

[morebikes]

On Team Triplets post in the members bike section, he mentions ordering a prop stand due to the advice not to lay the bike down for to long. Will look at the Rohloff site when I have time (at work on Monday I hope!)unless someone knows more already.

[Team Triplet]

quote:Originally posted by morebikes

On Team Triplets post in the members bike section, he mentions ordering a prop stand due to the advice not to lay the bike down for to long. Will look at the Rohloff site when I have time (at work on Monday I hope!)unless someone knows more already.

The Rohloff handbook is where I got the advice from.  It stated that if you laid the hub down, oil could leak from the hub.

[LowFlyingHawk]

The manual says to transport upright - but that seems to be in planes.

[Billy]

Thr traditional advice for any bike is not to lay it on its side going back to  when all hubs were oiled and not greased.

[graham]

Mine came with a single sheet warning page enclosed with the manual.

'Since 09/03 all Rohloff speedhub 500/14 models are equipped with modified, low friction hub seals. In contrast to the former seals, they have a sheet metal housing. To minimise friction, gasket-less hub bearings are mounted.

Therefore, do not lay the hub/ wheel to the open side after removing:
- the sprocket
- the axle ring
- the external gear mech

Gearbox oil could spill out.'

Not being fluent in German, I can't tell if there is any further mentions of oil leakage in the full manual. But I doubt if there are. It's supposed to be a virtually maintenace free, all weather, fit and forget wonder of German Engineering.

So: if you take the hub to bits and lay it on the open side it might leak. What a surprise!

If the hub doesn't leak when spinning, loaded, at 100rpm or more (and mine doesn't), why would it leak when stationary and unloaded at any angle?

[morebikes]

Sounds like there are no problems with the camping /tent senario.
If there was I am sure it would have come to light on some forum somewhere, and I've not found anything else.
Guess I am going to have to buy one somewhen still.

[LowFlyingHawk]

As an aside - how big is your tent?  This is probably a general question that anybody who cycle/camps could answer as well.  I have hiking/camping gear and am not planning on carrying on the bike anything more than I can carry with a backpack (seems unnecessary to me to carry any more).  Is it wise to have a bigger tent so you can sleep with the bike?

[morebikes]

I am not over experienced at cycle camping, but I have always left the bike outside with a plastic bag over the saddle. I normally like to tuck the wheel under part of the tent so I would hear if it was moved, maybe wrapping a guy line round it would make it harder to move without being woken up.

[Sprocket]

I use a Saunders Spacepacker tent, which suits me and my bike. I leave the inner tent at home and just sleep under the flysheet, which pegs down all round the edge. The doors are too small to get the bike through, so it is a case of pitching the flysheet first, then unhooking all the pegs on one side, laying the tent over, laying the bike on the space left by the tent, and then re peg the flysheet up over the bike. Half the tent is taken up by the bike, and half by me. No one can run off with the bike in the night, unless they take the tent down first. It can get a bit breezy with no tent inner, so I kip in a goretex bivvi bag.

[Sprocket]

Getting a bit off topic here, but have a look at http://www.bbc.co.uk/devon/news_features/2004/cyclist_diary/16082004.shtml for a cautionary tale about leaving bikes outside tents. Sorry if you've already seen it, it was in all the newspapers a few weeks back.

[Stijn]

According to Rohloff the hub will still work even without oil but it’s internal efficiency decreases from 0.005 to 0.1% (this was quoted on a forum somewhere). I just changed the oil in my hub for the first time. Wow, what a difference! What did puzzle me was, what little oil came out of the hub during the change. Which means I must have lost a lot of oil, but I never noticed it. The hub was initially filled with 25ml, I estimate only 10ml came. maybe some stuck to the internals.

Anyway it runs much smoother now and sounds like clock work. The hub does get much quieter once it’s worn in and with a clean batch of lub.

Cheers,

Stijn

[Frank Tompson]

Stijn,

Thanks to your posting I can relax a little. I was most concerned at how little oil came out, but clearly you had the same issue. I assume the right amount of oil went in in the first place............?

[Dave Whittle Thorn Workshop]

quote:what little oil came out of the hub during the change. Which means I must have lost a lot of oil, but I never noticed it. The hub was initially filled with 25ml, I estimate only 10ml came. maybe some stuck to the internals.

Quite alot stays in the hub, probably about 10ml.

Dave Whittle SJSC