Basic Freecoaster Maintenance

Maintaing a freecoaster is one of the most daunting things about owning a freecoaster.  If you don't maintain your freecoaster, it will blow up much faster than any other part on your bike, so lets learn the right way to do this.



             Personally, I rebuild my coaster every two weeks.  Rebuilding should be done anywhere from 2 weeks to two months.  Two months is the absolute maximum that you should go without re greasing your hub, otherwise you run the risk of blowing bearings, and shredding internals, leaving you with a useless $200 paperweight.

Grease

The type of grease that you use in your hub is more important than you might think.  Use too heavy of a grease and your hub will feel sluggish, light grease will not last long at all and not provide proper lubrication long enough before you replace the grease.  Stay away from oils and wax lubricants as these are too thin and won't do much for your coaster.  Heavy bearing grease is much too viscous and makes everything slow and hard to pedal.  The best two greases to use are white lithium or phil wood grease.  White lithium grease is a good balance between heavy and light and can be found very cheap from OSH, Home Depot or pretty much any hardware store.  Phil wood grease is more expensive and usually will only be found at a bike shop, but is a better choice than white lithium if you can afford it.  I used white lithium grease for almost 3 years and just recently switched to Phil Wood grease, and the difference is definitely noticeable, but regular lithium grease works just fine.  

What You Need

1.  A freecoaster (obviously)

2.  An adjustable wrench or cone wrench 

3. A set of allen keys

4.  Grease

5.  Paper towels or rags

6.  Rubber mallet or a hammer and a block of wood and an old axle nut 

How to Rebuild Your KHE Design Freecoaster

First, you are going to want to take the wheel off of your bike, and unscrew the axle nuts.  Then you are going to insert the allen key into the slot in the axle, and take the drive side cone nut off.  The driver should screw out and be able to be pulled off.  After you take off the driver, put an old axle nut onto the drive side of the hub, with part of the nut sticking out above the axle.  Now take a mallet or a hammer and a block of wood and tap lightly until the axle assembly pops out of the non drive side, and take off the axle nut to allow the axle to come all the way off.  Insert the Allen key into the axle and take the non drive side cone nut off.  The bearing on the non drive side of the axle, along with the stepped spacer should slide right off, and the axle should look like this:

Everything that is greased on the hub that you have when you take it out are the places you should grease.  Make sure to grease the seats of the bearings as well.  Wipe all of the grease off of the axle and parts, and replace it with your grease of choice.  It should look exactly the same as when you took it off, except with a little bit more grease.  Take pictures of everything the first time you take them out to remember the order and if it should be greased or not.  Make sure to grease the threads of the driver and clutch as well, and and on all of the non threaded parts of the axle.  Now, take the stepped washer and put it back on, along with any slack spacers, followed by the non drive side bearing.  Now put the non drive side cone nut back on.  The tapered piece with the threads and little spines on the outside should still be in the shell.  If it isn't, put it on the axle before the stepped washer.  Put the axle assembly back into the hub shell, and thread the driver in to make sure the bearing goes back in straight.  Put the old axle nut back onto the non drive side just a bit, and tap it back into the hub until the bearing is all the way seated.  Now the last step is to take the little tapered washer and put it back onto the driver with the curved side facing the driver, and the drive side cone nut back on. Hand tighten the cone nuts, and then tighten them just slightly with a wrench. These instructions should work on any freecoaster with KHE internals such as the Primo Freemix, Demolition Rotator, Colony Freecoaster, Federal Freecoaster, Shadow Raptor and many more hubs.  If you get stuck and can't  figure out what to do, check out these youtube videos for visual aid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ede3YZViOps  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iueOqR7-zZ4  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLGQ2-u4RQw