likely water damage in Son 28 on tour any advice

[pandanroll]

Hello,

We have just finished a cycling tour in Central Asia, soon to fly to Tbilisi and continue cycling back to the U.K. via Turkey.

A few weeks ago I greased the QR axle of our Son 28 hub, as I was staying at a hostel and there was some spare grease going so I greased everything on the bike which I though needed greasing. Obviously greasing the Son 28 QR axle goes against Son’s instructions and was a mistake.

Since then we have cycled up a 3800 m mountain pass, including a few cold water stream crossings, and then descended about 2000m to warmer climates.

A couple of days after descending, the Son 28 stopped producing a charge. I have connected lights and a Sinewave directly to the hub, using separate connectors, and both do not produce a charge.

The hub is under a year old. The bike shop I bought it from in London can only help if I bring the unit it for inspection.

Reading this article (https://bikepacking.com/plog/inside-son-dynamo-hubs/), I understand the grease has likely prevented condensation from escaping the hub during the temperature change and water has formed within the hub, and caused damage.

Does anyone reading this have any advice on how to potentially fix this?

It’s not a trip ending damage, but I would much prefer to have the lights working when we cycle back through Europe on the early winter months.

Many thanks,
PR

[mickeg]

I really do not know why it would stop producing power, the coils are still surrounded by the rotating magnets, thus as long as it keeps rotating correctly with good bearings, I would expect it to produce power.

If you can get any grease removed from the hub, I think that would be the first step.

It might require pipe cleaners from the era when people used to smoke tobacco in pipes.  If you can get any gardening twine through the hole, perhaps by wrapping it around a thin wire and getting the wire through it first, that could help wipe any out.  I use gardening twine like a floss to clean my derailleur cassettes, in between the sprockets.

Good luck.  I would leave it wired up to the charger and lights, you might get lucky and find it comes back to life later?

[pandanroll]

Thank you. I’ve cleaned the grease off the QRand within the hub as best as possible.

I contacted SON who were helpful. They raised the possibility that the connection had broken within the hub, but on inspecting the photos they said it was unlikely as the spades were not significantly misaligned from the serial number. I’m attaching the document they sent for fixing this issue in case anyone is interested to read it.

As it happened, they suggested I try a bike mechanic in Tbilisi, where we are now, was they’d heard good things about them. I’ve dropped the wheel off with them so let’s see what happens.

[Tiberius]

pandanroll - Many thanks for posting the above, bound to come in useful one day.