Re: [BOB] Re: TC hub, chromed, finally!

[Patrick Moore]

Ian: Here finally are photos as I promised of the 1999 Joe Starck fixed gear 26" wheel custom with the TC hub and with the Elk Pass tires back on in place of the Naches Passes.

I'm copying the list in case anyone is interested.

The TC came from a IHG aficionado on the IGH list who has owned far more old SA IGH hubs than I. The innards were good, so I had the rusty shell re-chromed in Seattle and the innards inspected, cleaned, and lubed by IGH-meister Aaron at Rat City Bikes in the same city (Aaron orchestrated the chroming at a local shop). Aaron also swapped out the TC-specific 12-spline driver for a modern AW driver so I can use modern 3/32" cheap SA cogs. (The TF has the same 12-spline pattern but won't accept an AW driver, so I had modern cogs adapted to fit that 12-spline driver; works fine.)

Again: TC: direct + 86.54%, so 76" and 66"; TF: direct + 75% -- like shifting from a 52 to a 39 t ring: 76" and 57".

The TF has almost no lash; it feels much like the Phil fixed/fixed hub. The TC has less lash than the unfortunate S3X but enough that it seems to have the defects of freewheel and fixed: there is much banging on over-run. Perhaps I need to work on my pedal stroke.

If anyone has a TF and would like to trade for an as-new TC, please look me up. (Craig: are you listening? Otherwise it's a shout into the abyss, I'm sure.) I can get similar ratios to the TC with my Phil and a 17/19 Dingle: 76" and 68", and the wheel has a QR skewer.

Altogether under $500 total for the hub, about half what I spent for the TF which was NOS with all the bits including the quadrant shifter on the tt, + a handfull of NOS 1/8" 12-spline SA cogs, all shipped from England.

Shifter: That's the TF shifter in the picture. I had thought it pulled insufficient cable to shift the TC reliably; on my first test runs the TC started to skip in underdrive after a few miles. Looking back on things, I rather think that was because I had one of those combo slotted-head/Phillips head screws on the clamp and didn't torque it down hard enough. I replaced that bolt with an allen head bolt and at least on today's ride there was no skipping. But I did not stand and mash mightily up hills in underdrive. I did find a NOS -- and much prettier: silver -- quadrant 3-speed shifter on British eBay, which has a much longer pull between 1 and 2 than between 2 and 3, and I may install that when I next mess with the wheel and shifting setup.

I'm sure everyone has long since stopped reading, so I'll stop writing. But nice mid-workday ride on a pretty Spring day at 61*F, sun (finally!), low humidity, and moderate wind.

I add a couple of pics of #2 with the TF and the Naches Passes, which I rode for a week or so on our moisture-firmed ditchbank roads.

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Patrick Moore

Alburquerque, Nuevo Mexico, Etats Unis d'Amerique, Orbis Terrarum

[Ian A]

Patrick:

Thank you for the detailed write-up and the photos. To see such superb old technology restored (and adapted where needed/desired) is inspiring. The TC looks magnificent with the new chrome. Aaron clearly knows his stuff.  It seems you prefer the TF for your riding style. To think 1937 construction and technology holds its own against 2023 market offerings shows the ingenuity of those 1930's designers and engineers.

The Paul fixed/fixed with a dingle certainly match and possibly exceed the early British devotion to quality and design, but for the practical elegance of shifting a two speed fixed gear drivetrain on the fly, those  Sturmey Archer hubs hold their own and more.

IanA Alberta Canada

[ascpgh]

Patrick, kudos on the return to appearance and function of that hub! Stuff that works deserves to be kept serviceable and this is certainly a great example. The fact that your senses are rewarded by its operation under your riding circumstances and that you have been able to return it to original or better condition is awesome. Thanks for sharing your observations and its progress.

I am in the camp of those who perceive the bike part makers narrowing their objectives and becoming interested mainly in selling the latest gizmos to people of either experience or mostly of concern for keeping up with the latest kit rather than propagating continued use of something made previously. That new hub based system that can vary tire pressure comes to mind, which is really a "say no more" item in my mind compared to your hub.

Andy Cheatham 

Pittsburgh

[Ryan]

The hub looks lovely. But enlighten me please. What is TC and TF?

[Patrick Moore]

Andy: I am always as you know far more than happy to bloviate about my bikes and bits, but thanks for your thanks.

I do enjoy hub gears for some reason; it's not merely a whimsey or conceit. I suppose I like the limitations they impose on my riding: like a fixed drivetrain does, but giving just a wee bit more in possibilities to accommodate my aging legs and lungs. The TF in particular is superb.

For pure practicality for most riding nothing beats a mid-level Shimano derailleur drivetrain. But I find a great deal of pleasure in having to adapt my pedaling and breathing to different conditions with just 1 fixed, and now 2 fixed gears; ditto for the 3 speed fw IGH on another bike. And there is certainly aesthetic pleasure in the simplicity of an IGH drivetrain, with all the moving bits packaged nicely away inside a shiny hub shell.

I suppose too that growing up in ex British colonies 20 years and even 5 years after independence, with the preponderance of Brit mid-century tech still kicking about, had something to do with it (and not just bikes; big Jags, real Mini Coopers, Ford Anglias, Morris minors, as well as Beano comics, Enid Blyton, and pork pies; etc etc).

Ryan: Sturmey Archer made dozens of different models starting with its first hub in 1902 (tho' there had been epicyclic hub gears before that; the first I think I read was a 2-speed made for the hubs of "boneshakers" -- so even before the "pennyfarthings."

http://sturmey-archerheritage.com

From the 1930s at least, if not before to the early 1960s or late '50s SA made in addition to their wide range hubs a number of medium and close ratio hubs, free and fixed, for the club market, 2, 3, 4, and 5 speeds. I have a medium ratio 3 speed fw IGH wheel on my road/errand bike, the AM hub (my 2 were made in 1955 and 1956 and have aluminum shells) with direct, 15.55% overdrive and 86.54% underdrive (with a 65" direct that's 75" and 56" for indirect gears).

For the blue gofast, designed originally for a fixed drivetrain, I bought the TF and the TC for extra headwind and hill wheels: the TC is direct and 86.54%, so geared to 76" in direct I get a 66" headwind gear; and the TF gives ms 76" direct and a 57" climbing gear. The TC's innards are slightly more complex than those of the TF and there is a lot more internal slop whereas the TF has very simple internals and almost no slop at all. Both are dated 1937 and both have steel shells. The TF was NOS, the TC refurbished.

[Patrick Moore]

Aside: I came at least within visual or spitting distance of a SA AR hub: John Allen, inheritor of Sheldon's website, was selling Sheldon's hub gear collection on behalf of Sheldon's famioy that included at least 1 fixed 3 speed ASC and the unspeakably wonderful AR, very close ratio 3-speed fw hub with direct, 7.24% overdrive and 93.245 underdrive: the equivalent of 1-tooth jumps. But though I piped up he was apparently selling the collection entire, not in parts, alas.

With that hub I could get 63" 68" and 73"; lovely.

107.24
100
93.24