Sticky Freehub

dread_i1

Picked up a new bike on Saturday morning, have just been out in the garage checking it all over and when the back wheel is held of the ground and spun the free hub, cassette and the rest of the drive train turn forwards slowly. Once you are riding the bike obviously this is not noticeable as you are on the pedals, however surely this is creating some amount of resistance. The bike is a Felt F3 and was a purchased from a member of a team as it was his old training bike, he told me that if there are any problems he can source any parts required so no issue there but id like to have an idea of what is causing it and get it sorted.

Thanks for any help
Jon

desweller

Probably just drag on the seals. Don't worry about it unless you can feel rumbling or play.

cycleclinic

It is not creating any noticable resitance. Run some 3 n 1 oil into the freehub with the cassette of or even better witht the freehub off. That should help a bit. The freehub is begining its long decline to failure. It will take a while a long while.

Whether replacement freehubs are available will depend on the brand of the hub.

dread_i1

Thanks for the advice, i'll give this a try. Do you think its worth asking the guy I got it from if he could get me a new free hub or has it got plenty of life still in it.

desweller

It is not necessarily the freehub.

If you want to be sure then you can take it to bits and give it a quick service. They are not usually very complicated.

How old is the wheel?

keef66

If it's a Shimano freehub the only thing you can easily do is take it off the hub, pick out the seal, and drizzle some light oil in there. The internals aren't designed with DIY servicing in mind and you can't buy the individual components from Shimano as spares.

dread_i1

The bike is a 2012 model however the wheels were not overly used as the guy had his race wheels on the bike at times. They are Sram al27's