Ritchey Zero hub freewheel problem

Thought I would direct this problem to you geniuses on rec.bicycles.tech.

I have a set of six month old Ritchey Pro Aero road wheels on my Orbea. I
like the wheels themselves- they are nice and strong, with no buckles or
broken spokes to date. However, the rear "Zero" system hub has been the
source of some annoyance. A few weeks back the freewheel assembly started
making an awful loose bearing sound, the kind of sound you would expect to
hear when a bearing race has absolutely no lubrication and loose balls are
knocking against metal. At this stage I thought I may have been a bit
enthusiastic whilst washing the bike the day previous, and that I had
somehow managed to wash the grease out of the freewheel assembly (I had used
a spray on degreaser on the hub cassette). Rather than claim under warranty
at the place of purchase, I gave the wheel to my LBS boy wonder mechanic.
Boy wonder took apart the assembly, and found little lubrication in the
bearings. His comment was that it looked like the factory hadn't put enough
lubrication into the freewheel assembly, and stated that my washing was only
a contributing factor and not the main factor leading to the problem. Boy
wonder then repacked the bearings and reassembled the freewheel, and
everything was OK.

Until today that is. The awful freewheel noise has returned (only appears
whilst freewheeling), and this time there was no bike washing prior to the
event involved. Nor has the hub been exposed to any other unusual
conditions. This makes me think there is another issue causing this noise,
perhaps a design fault.

So, does anyone here know if this is a common problem with Ritchey Zero rear
hubs? Anyone know what causes it? Ritchey components have little support
here in Australia, and whilst the wheel are under warranty, I would like to
avoid the downtime associated with making a claim. The Ritchey distributor
is located in another state, and the dealer has indicated that they will
insist on sending the wheel back to the distributor for inspection. It would
help me immensly if I knew the nature of the problem before I start arguing
with the dealer.

Thanks in advance,

Sasha

"Sasha" wrote in message
...
Thought I would direct this problem to you geniuses on rec.bicycles.tech.

I have a set of six month old Ritchey Pro Aero road wheels on my Orbea. I

I feel your pain. I have a set of Ritchey wheels with the WCS hubs. They
aren't the same wheels as yours, but probably the same hubs. I've had them
about 3 years. They're simply fantastic wheels except for the freehub body.
According to my LBS, it looks like they really cut a corner there. He
claims they adapted a low-end shimano freehub body and did a few things of
their own to it ... so it can't be replaced with a better shimano freehub
body. My LBS called them and got a new freehub body shipped out. It did
the same thing after about three months. So I contacted Ritchey and got on
their case. They sent me several replacement freehubs at no charge. The
funny thing is, since they did that, I haven't had the problem happen again
.... in thousands and thousands (tens of thousands, actually) of miles.

But that's the problem. They installed one inferior component and you're
experiencing the consequences.

Good luck,
Bob C.

"Sasha" wrote in message ...
Thought I would direct this problem to you geniuses on rec.bicycles.tech.

I have a set of six month old Ritchey Pro Aero road wheels on my Orbea. I
like the wheels themselves- they are nice and strong, with no buckles or
broken spokes to date. However, the rear "Zero" system hub has been the
source of some annoyance. A few weeks back the freewheel assembly started
making an awful loose bearing sound, the kind of sound you would expect to
hear when a bearing race has absolutely no lubrication and loose balls are
knocking against metal. At this stage I thought I may have been a bit
enthusiastic whilst washing the bike the day previous, and that I had
somehow managed to wash the grease out of the freewheel assembly (I had used
a spray on degreaser on the hub cassette). Rather than claim under warranty
at the place of purchase, I gave the wheel to my LBS boy wonder mechanic.
Boy wonder took apart the assembly, and found little lubrication in the
bearings. His comment was that it looked like the factory hadn't put enough
lubrication into the freewheel assembly, and stated that my washing was only
a contributing factor and not the main factor leading to the problem. Boy
wonder then repacked the bearings and reassembled the freewheel, and
everything was OK.

Until today that is. The awful freewheel noise has returned (only appears
whilst freewheeling), and this time there was no bike washing prior to the
event involved. Nor has the hub been exposed to any other unusual
conditions. This makes me think there is another issue causing this noise,
perhaps a design fault.

So, does anyone here know if this is a common problem with Ritchey Zero rear
hubs? Anyone know what causes it? Ritchey components have little support
here in Australia, and whilst the wheel are under warranty, I would like to
avoid the downtime associated with making a claim. The Ritchey distributor
is located in another state, and the dealer has indicated that they will
insist on sending the wheel back to the distributor for inspection. It would
help me immensly if I knew the nature of the problem before I start arguing
with the dealer.

Thanks in advance,

Sasha


http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=e...com%26rnum%3D1

I had the same issue last year. To their credit - Ritchey took the
wheel back and rebuilt it up for me with a new (and seemingly
improved) hub. I was never able to get the cassette body off, and the
Ritchey Tech that emailed me said that it wouldn't come off for him
either. Wait for the off season and ship it off - they will make sure
you are content. Their customer service has always been among the
very best.

-a

Andrew Martin writes:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=e...com%26rnum%3D1

I had the same issue last year. To their credit - Ritchey took the
wheel back and rebuilt it up for me with a new (and seemingly
improved) hub. I was never able to get the cassette body off, and
the Ritchey Tech that emailed me said that it wouldn't come off for
him either. Wait for the off season and ship it off - they will
make sure you are content. Their customer service has always been
among the very best.

Did you discover what went wrong in the hub?

Meanwhile you ought to use TinyURL and reduce such long addresses to:

http://tinyurl.com/3wyhy

Just look in:

http://tinyurl.com/

Jobst Brandt

wrote in message ...
Andrew Martin writes:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=e...com%26rnum%3D1

I had the same issue last year. To their credit - Ritchey took the
wheel back and rebuilt it up for me with a new (and seemingly
improved) hub. I was never able to get the cassette body off, and
the Ritchey Tech that emailed me said that it wouldn't come off for
him either. Wait for the off season and ship it off - they will
make sure you are content. Their customer service has always been
among the very best.

Did you discover what went wrong in the hub?


No - the tech I spoke with was never able to free the body (or he gave
up and just got a new hub rather than sink the time into debugging the
old one).

Meanwhile you ought to use TinyURL and reduce such long addresses to:

http://tinyurl.com/3wyhy

Just look in:

http://tinyurl.com/

Jobst Brandt


I used to like tinyurl, until I followed a link on RBR supposedly
about some cyclocross article and it was belgium porno or
something...so I sort of lost faith in it unless it's from a known
sorce.

Thanks,
-a