The wire springs can be made, if the originals are broken or if you're missing one. I did this for the 3 speed freewheel that came with my Lewis. especially fun since the freewheel was just a bag of parts. Most hobby shops carry "music wire" in various sizes, and it forms fairly easily.
Steve Birmingham Lowell,Ma
Date: Wed, 16 Jun 2004 21:43:17 -0400 From: HM & SS Sachs <sachs@erols.com> To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org Subject: [CR]Regina freewheel re-assembly... Message-ID: <40D0F735.6040207@erols.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Precedence: list Message: 13
If you are obsessively curious, at some point you will want, yeah, need, to disassemble a Regina freewheel from the Dark Ages, one which takes a 2-notch remover. There are no good reasons for this, but the rationale this evening was a pile of new Regina bodies (Thanks, John Barron) and a nearly-new FW with the right gears but mashed notches.
Sure, you can unthread all the cogs (remembering that all are threaded, with about "n" different diameters, but in all cases the innermost two are LH thread). And the tool that holds the body by the pawl ratchets while you pull the last cog went extinct in the wild decades ago. But, it is so uncertain that any two bodies chosen at random will want the same cogs that I decided to just switch the innards.
Opening up a Regina is pretty easy; just mount the FW on a wheel or a dead hub mounted in a vise, then tap on the blind holes in the ring that bears the Regina stamp. Of course, this ring/bearing cone is LH thread, too. If you are really smart, you can even dump the outer balls all in one pile before lifting the outer assembly off the inner body. That's when the pawls and pawl springs notice the local supergravity and go walk-about, but you can find them easily, since you swept the floor last year. Then a pile of the inner race balls can be made.
Now, putting it together is just the reverse, if you have fingers about 0.1 mm. thick, to hold the pawls compressed while sliding the inner body into the outer. Or have the proper obsolete tool. But first, remember that grease is nice for the balls (holds them in place while you swear and shake), but should not go to the pawls. So, here is the $10,000 secret, and don't forget where you heard it. Grab a foot or so of sewing thread and wrap that around the inner body in such a way that it holds the pawls compressed, one turn or at most two. Voila (or cello, if you prefer), the two body halves will marry up again. Now, you find and replace the LH cone that says Regina on it, and tighten it down. That's when nothing turns (5-speed fixed gear) since you forgot that paper-thin washer that spaces the cone from the body. Fortunately, you don't have to pull out the inner to slip that puppy on, and then it seems to work.
Except for the thread you cleverly used to compress the pawls. Remember the thread. It's still there, wrapped around the inner body and holding the pawls in compression. Or not. I find that it can be extracted with some concentration, some Zen peacefulness, and carefully rotating the FW cogs while gently tugging. If it breaks off inside, you have several choices: (a) sell it (not recommended). (b) trash it. (c) throw it back in the box until you forget. It's likely to ride ok for a long time. (4) go back up to the paragraph that starts, "Opening..." And happily iterate until the beer is gone. :-)
This trick has worked fine for Suntours, too.
Ah, one other pedantic note about blessings. If you open up a REgina and the pawl springs look like carefully bent brass shim stock, you have been living right. Otherwise, you have the infamous invisibly thin and incredibly springy wire "hairpin" springs, which are older. If you don't find them, you can tell that they had been there because the pawls will have a slot cut into the inner surface to train the hairpin spring to stay put. No, they can't ever be found again, because they vaporize instantaneously on exposure to light and curses. Except in rare cases when you step on one and it stabs you very deeply.
Your mileage may vary.
harvey sachs