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Nev, What's the price; are they sill there?
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Nothing the matter with DT spokes- quality has been top notch in my experience.
Also, because the thread is in the same place (relative to the rim) on long and short nipples, you can't use shorter spokes with longer nipples, unless the short nips would have been OK anyway- you'll land up with too little thread engaged. This may, or may not cause catastrophic failure of your wheel. Not a good place to gamble, IMHO.
Ermmm . . NO. I routinely use 16mm nipples, where the spoke I've got is 3 to 6mm too short. They have 4mm more depth of thread than 12mm nipples.
Actually keeping 16mm nipples in stock is well worthwhile. You can use a spoke up to 2mm over or 2mm under it's ''correct'' length (If you're 2mm under, it'll poke through the head of the nipple. So just run round, when all is done, with an angle grinder and take them back to flush. If you're 2mm over, it'll still have 5mm of thread engaged, and that's plenty). So you can keep - say - 292's, and use them for anything between 290 and 298.
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Never needed a cotter press in my bike-fixing life - which goes back to 1952.
The secret to getting them out isn't complicated:
1: Undo nut, remove washer. Spray both ends with penetrating oil or WD40. Leave for some hours.
2: Replace nut, without the washer. But leave it loose, so its top face is level with the end of the pin.
3: Remove the bike's wheels.
4: Find a steel tube (I use a tube spanner) that is a loose fit around the head of the pin, and longer than half the diameter of the chainwheel.
5: Perch the bike on the tube, so the head of the cotterpin is inside the end of the tube, and the bike's weight is sitting on the crank head, on the tube. Which is on a solid concrete floor.
6: Take a large round punch, that covers both the end of the pin thread, and the nut.
7: Hit it once, VERY hard, with a 2lb. hammer.
8: Remove the nut (this will ease out any thread distortion caused by the punch)
9: Continue with the punch, directly on the cotterpin. It should now come out without much more force.NB. Yes, as you'll have noticed, this does need four hands. So you need an assistant.
The key point is to take the force of the hammer-blow directly from the crank head to something solid, NOT passing it through the bb bearings and the frame. Apart from wrecking the bearings, that robs the hammer-blow of most of its impact force.
If you have to do this frequently, there are two more specialised methods:
1: Make up a ''closed sleeve nut'' - that screws onto the cotter in place of the normal nut, is closed at the top, and is slim enough to fit into the cotter-hole in the crank head. Make sure the thread in the nut has enough 'headroom' that the end of the nut bears directly onto the unthreaded shank of the cotter.
2: Use an ultrasonic driver, holding it directly on each end of the pin in turn.
– remember Doctor Who's Ultrasonic Screwdriver? Well, this is it! -
Flobukki,
Why complain about the lack of good frames in Austria, when you have some of the best Classic Lightweight frames right there: Puch (or Austro-Daimler, for the US market)?Their Ultima, Superleicht and Vent Noir models are amongst the most sought-after of all the 1970s classics. They sponsored both European and American racing teams, with some really nice racing frames. I believe they sold out to Bianchi around 1980, but the Puch name (and the bikes) kept on for some time afterwards.
Do they have charity (or thrift) shops in Austria, where old bikes can be bought?
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So why's everyone sneering at 501? It's seamless double-butted, like 531; just Cr-Mo instead of Mn-Mo. Look on Reynolds' own frame/weight charts, and you'll see a 'standard' 501 frame is just 100 grammes heavier than the same in 531. 2200gms vs 2100gms. How many riders are going to notice that?
And another thing: although the chrome in 501 is nowhere near enough to make it stainless, the old bike mechanics used to say it was a lot less prone to rusting than 531.
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I've got a complete bike: a mixte Gitane 'Manhattan' hybrid. About 50cm. Early 1990's, and virtually unused. Only problem is it's in mid-grey hammer-finish enamel - not exactly a girly thing!
Nice kit on it though -mostly original - Maeda - SunTour.
pattivee: yes, alloy rims do exist. Weinmann made them. But not many, and a long time ago. In essence, by the time [±1970] alloy rims replaced steel, 26 x 1 1/4'' [21 x 597] was already obsolescent, if not obsolete. So they're rare.