rain and wheels

Smear some _waterproof_ grease around the OUTSIDE of the bearing covers,
this will help keep the rain out if you're concerned.

- -
Comments and opinions compliments of,
"Your Friendly Neighborhood Wheelman"

Messages sent to the above "E" addy will be lost forever!

to E-mail me:
ChrisZCorner "at" webtv "dot" net

My website:
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In article <[email hidden]>,

Quoted message said:

Hello. I'm going to be riding in a charity event tomorrow and they're
calling for rain. I have a set of Bontrager X-Lite wheels and I'm a
bit concerned about water getting into the bearings. I'm pretty sure
they're sealed but should I still be concerned about riding them in the
rain?

I also hear that water can get into the rim through the spoke holes on
many wheels.
--

In article <[email hidden]>,

(Chris Y.F.N.W.) said:

Smear some _waterproof_ grease around the OUTSIDE of the bearing covers,
this will help keep the rain out if you're concerned.

Scary thought. Once you start to spin the wheels, I can just imagine
those grease slowly creeping via the spokes onto the rims.... And then
onto brake tracks.
--

Artoi said:

In article <[email hidden]>,

(Chris Y.F.N.W.) said:

Smear some _waterproof_ grease around the OUTSIDE of the bearing covers,
this will help keep the rain out if you're concerned.

Scary thought. Once you start to spin the wheels, I can just imagine
those grease slowly creeping via the spokes onto the rims.... And then
onto brake tracks.

He said smear a bit of grease over the seal, not heave big glopping fistfuls
over the hubs.

Ron

Artoi said:

In article <[email hidden]>,

Quoted message said:

Hello. I'm going to be riding in a charity event tomorrow and they're
calling for rain. I have a set of Bontrager X-Lite wheels and I'm a
bit concerned about water getting into the bearings. I'm pretty sure
they're sealed but should I still be concerned about riding them in the
rain?

I also hear that water can get into the rim through the spoke holes on
many wheels.

It does.

None of this is a worry. Or at least there's nothing for it but to go ride and
not worry about it. Clean dry and perhaps repack afterward if it gets real
crazy.

Ron

"RonSonic" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Artoi said:

In article <[email hidden]>,

(Chris Y.F.N.W.) said:

Smear some _waterproof_ grease around the OUTSIDE of the bearing

covers,

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

this will help keep the rain out if you're concerned.

Scary thought. Once you start to spin the wheels, I can just imagine
those grease slowly creeping via the spokes onto the rims.... And then
onto brake tracks.

He said smear a bit of grease over the seal, not heave big glopping

fistfuls

Quoted message said:

over the hubs.

The seals should be sufficient to resist a day's worth of rain. I ride
twenty year old Ultegra/EX hubs in driving rain and puddles up to the bottom
of my pedal stroke for weeks or months at a time, and they go a full season
before repacking. If these wheels cannot take a day in the rain, they
should be sh** canned.-- Jay Beattie.

Quoted message said:

Hello. I'm going to be riding in a charity event tomorrow and they're
calling for rain. I have a set of Bontrager X-Lite wheels and I'm a
bit concerned about water getting into the bearings. I'm pretty sure
they're sealed but should I still be concerned about riding them in the
rain?

Thanks

If ya really get drenched, have yourself or a decent LBS overhaul the
hubs, BB and headset after the ride.

Quoted message said:

Smear some _waterproof_ grease around the OUTSIDE of the bearing covers,
this will help keep the rain out if you're concerned.

Hmmm, I am not sure but it seems to me that this is OK as long as it is just
a tiny bit of grease and that you remove it before you ride into dusty or
sandy conditions. In my mind the grease on the outside is really just a
collection point to capture dust which will be caried through the seal.

Yes/No?
Dave

Quoted message said:

Comments and opinions compliments of,
"Your Friendly Neighborhood Wheelman"

Messages sent to the above "E" addy will be lost forever!

to E-mail me:
ChrisZCorner "at" webtv "dot" net

My website:
http://geocities.com/czcorner

Qui si parla Campagnolo said:

Quoted message said:

Hello. I'm going to be riding in a charity event tomorrow and they're
calling for rain. I have a set of Bontrager X-Lite wheels and I'm a
bit concerned about water getting into the bearings. I'm pretty sure
they're sealed but should I still be concerned about riding them in the
rain?

If ya really get drenched, have yourself or a decent LBS overhaul the
hubs, BB and headset after the ride.

Are we talking about something like fording a river with the bicycle
strapped onto your back? Otherwise I can't imagine overhauling the bike
just because I got rained on. Even a good driving rain. If I did that
I'd spend more time taking my bike apart and putting it back together
than riding it.

--
Dane Buson - [email hidden]
"Drinking through your hair is neither tasty nor nutritious."
-Anonymous

Artoi said:

In article <[email hidden]>,

(Chris Y.F.N.W.) said:

Smear some _waterproof_ grease around the OUTSIDE of the bearing covers,
this will help keep the rain out if you're concerned.

Scary thought. Once you start to spin the wheels, I can just imagine
those grease slowly creeping via the spokes onto the rims.... And then
onto brake tracks.

I guess I should degrease and strip all the grease and oil off my
freewheel and chain. I can just imagine it slowly creeping via the
spokes or dripping onto the rims... and then onto brake tracks.
'

"Qui si parla Campagnolo" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Hello. I'm going to be riding in a charity event tomorrow and they're
calling for rain. I have a set of Bontrager X-Lite wheels and I'm a
bit concerned about water getting into the bearings. I'm pretty sure
they're sealed but should I still be concerned about riding them in the
rain?

Thanks

If ya really get drenched, have yourself or a decent LBS overhaul the
hubs, BB and headset after the ride.

Are you serious Peter? Sometimes I get drenched three times a week. If I had
to take apart half of my bike everytime I got drenched it would be very time
consuming. In my experience this is not necessery. I rinse of my bike, dry
it and put it in a dry storage. That's all. Overhaul my hubs every 3-6
months, my headset once per season and my BB stays where it is; there is
nothing you can do with those cartridge BB. My Record BB still going strong
after 25000 km.
I think there are very, very few people who are overhauling every bearing
afte a rainy ride.

Lou

RonSonic said:

Artoi said:

I also hear that water can get into the rim through the spoke holes on
many wheels.

It does.

None of this is a worry. Or at least there's nothing for it but to go ride and
not worry about it. Clean dry and perhaps repack afterward if it gets real
crazy.

Even less to worry about: rims don't have bearings.

On Thu, 28 Sep 2006 06:27:44 -0700, Dane Buson <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

Qui si parla Campagnolo said:

Quoted message said:

Hello. I'm going to be riding in a charity event tomorrow and they're
calling for rain. I have a set of Bontrager X-Lite wheels and I'm a
bit concerned about water getting into the bearings. I'm pretty sure
they're sealed but should I still be concerned about riding them in the
rain?

If ya really get drenched, have yourself or a decent LBS overhaul the
hubs, BB and headset after the ride.

Are we talking about something like fording a river with the bicycle
strapped onto your back? Otherwise I can't imagine overhauling the bike
just because I got rained on. Even a good driving rain. If I did that
I'd spend more time taking my bike apart and putting it back together
than riding it.

Dear Dane,

The bike path on my daily ride is about a hundred miles south of
Peter's lair in Boulder, Colorado. The path used to have a charming
warning sign that read "Caution: Trail May Be Underwater." In the
summer, the Arkansas River sometimes ran down the path for a hundred
yards, but they've replaced the leaky washer in the tap in the dam
upstream, so things are drier lately. The water was rather cold and
clean, coming from the bottom of a 180-foot reservoir, and it was just
an inch or so below my bottom bracket.

Where rain is rare but often dramatic, the problem is not so much the
stuff falling from the skies as the stuff collecting in the puddles on
the road. Last Saturday, I was greeted by "Road Closed" signs when I
reached the City Park, hours after a morning rainstorm. They hadn't
finished pumping out the lagoon that forms at the end of the long
straightaway, so it was still knee-deep and waiting hopefully for cars
dumb enough to drive into it while tailgating at 30-40 mph in the 20
mph zone.

Last month, a little rain filled up the familiar interstate underpass
at 29th Street, and the television news entertained everyone with
footage of a woman essentially driving into a lake. Luckily, one of my
clients and three other fellows saved her:

"A fast-moving rainstorm that dumped as much as 3 inches of rain and
hail completely washed out the 29th Street railroad underpass. The
water rose nearly halfway to the Burlington Northern tracks above."

http://www.chieftain.com/metro/1156660111/2

Nice picture of the hail, too. About two weeks later, I spent 20
minutes under a cottonwood tree, waiting for worse hail to stop. Then
I rode a few miles up the bike path. For long stretches, I rode in
ice-water over my pedals as the storm drained onto the path from the
bluffs. Elsewhere, the path was a solid bed of pea-sized hail that had
been flushed out of the weeds and brush and trapped when the water
receded--think of a white gravel road.

All this nonsense occurs because most of the time there's hardly any
rain at all, so drainage is neglected. Who worries about water damage
next to cactus?

Cheers,

Carl Fogel