More Maytag Mayhem

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msrfan

Well-Known Member
Sep 17, 2010
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Southern California
That's really a cool drive. I was thinking if you can't get enough traction from your hub, maybe build up rubber on it and then lace wire back and forth through the spoke holes. The wire would hold the rubber in place without letting it spin and also provide some grip. Just a thought. I really like the way it's looking.
 

cannonball2

Well-Known Member
Oct 28, 2010
3,682
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Colonial Coast USA.
Thanks! I take that as quite a compliment from you sir!
If the contact cement fails and the tread departs, I had contemplated lashing it down with two bands of stainless safety wire run radially with the twisted ends buried in grooves in the tread.
I have a feeling the cement will hold. Even in the engines ungoverned slightly modified state I doubt it makes more than one and a half horsepower, so nothing is really taxed.
Now if the old IGH will just hold up. Will find out tomorrow!
 

Citi-sporter

Active Member
Jun 16, 2014
206
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North Bend, Or,
OK I am really liking this bike as it progresses.

Some notes about 3 speed IGH's. They tend to throw their oil film on the planetaries outward if run at speed.

I knew a guy who made front wheel drive, arm and leg powered recumbents that had a 20" front wheel laced with a Sturmey SC3 coaster 3 speed. Since he rode it most of the time at some pretty fast speeds, he found the hub needed oiling every couple hundred miles. Not a big issue but I'm guessing with the speed of the Maytag it's going to be more frequent.

I think frequent oiling with some sticky lube like chainsaw bar oil, 50 weight non detergent, or Golden Spectro Synthetic if you want to get fancy, would be fine.

With the Shimano it's best to oil through the shifter-plunger rod hole in the axle. just a few drops at most. You could use thin bodied grease like Phil Wood's. Heavy oil is cheaper and being a total loss system probably wouldn't hurt it as it would flush debris and worn metal bits out.

You probably already know all of this, but I thought I'd add my dos centavos.
 

cannonball2

Well-Known Member
Oct 28, 2010
3,682
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Colonial Coast USA.
No Citi Im fairly new to IGHs. I packed this hub with Lucas Red n Tacky grease. It seems to hang in there well on my one CG engines primary gears that is not a wet clutch which has the gears in an oil bath. Since this hub has no oiler I assume it was intended for grease packing
As I posted in an earlier thread if I had an oiler hub I would be tempted to run 00 grease which is a semi-liquid. Its used in various transmissions on certain equipment, the most common is the old Snapper rear engine rider mower. It will stay in place in a trans even with no oil seals, but is runny enough to migrate a bit inside the trans. I actually had an old beater Honda M/C with shaft drive. The final drive oil would leak out pretty short order. Not wanting to invest any time/money in the thing, I drained and flushed the gear oil from the unit and filled it with 00. Rode it for years and never had a leak. It also has high pressure additives for gearing.

Bought a small radiator last night from a Kawasaki KX60 dirt bike. Price was experimental concept friendly at $15 shipped. First step in a thousand mile fabrication journey for a water cooled Maytag. Need a couple of extra cylinders, galvanized flashing, some copper tubing, and some luck!
 

Intrepid Wheelwoman

New Member
Oct 29, 2011
2,830
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Hauraki District, New Zealand
No Citi Im fairly new to IGHs. I packed this hub with Lucas Red n Tacky grease. It seems to hang in there well on my one CG engines primary gears that is not a wet clutch which has the gears in an oil bath. Since this hub has no oiler I assume it was intended for grease packing
As I posted in an earlier thread if I had an oiler hub I would be tempted to run 00 grease which is a semi-liquid. Its used in various transmissions on certain equipment, the most common is the old Snapper rear engine rider mower. It will stay in place in a trans even with no oil seals, but is runny enough to migrate a bit inside the trans. I actually had an old beater Honda M/C with shaft drive. The final drive oil would leak out pretty short order. Not wanting to invest any time/money in the thing, I drained and flushed the gear oil from the unit and filled it with 00. Rode it for years and never had a leak. It also has high pressure additives for gearing.

Bought a small radiator last night from a Kawasaki KX60 dirt bike. Price was experimental concept friendly at $15 shipped. First step in a thousand mile fabrication journey for a water cooled Maytag. Need a couple of extra cylinders, galvanized flashing, some copper tubing, and some luck!
Cool, - that's a conversion I'm going to be fascinated to see CB. :)
 

cannonball2

Well-Known Member
Oct 28, 2010
3,682
221
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Colonial Coast USA.
Got a chance to ride the bike today before the rains and it works well. Will almost pull from stop in low and will just creep along, second is a good cruise gear, and third is a bit high for such low HP but once you get rolling it fun to ease along at very low rpm putt putting along. Shifts just fine using the clutch, I don't back off the throttle since its hand operated, just leave it where it is, clutch, click and go on. My concern about the momentary cable slackness during clutching had no effect.
The bonded tire section doesn't seem phased by the riding. It conformed to the tires profile in about a half hour and really began to bite well. The hub actually seems to have less inherent drag than the previous roller, was able to lower the idle a bit. I see no issues with it at this point. Its all a matter of how well the hub lasts.
 

silverbear

The Boy Who Never Grew Up
Jul 9, 2009
8,325
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northeastern Minnesota
I have a feeling that the hub will hold up fine. It isn't like the engine is a torque monster. I think this is about the best possible use of an old 3 speed IGH... as a friction drive transmission. You're getting the benefit of all three gears, there is no expense with a clamshell hub adapter or hassle with a rag joint or chain tensioner. I'm guessing, too, that your rubber on rubber friction drive wouldn't tend to slip all that much in wet conditions. Nice.
SB
 

cannonball2

Well-Known Member
Oct 28, 2010
3,682
221
63
Colonial Coast USA.
Cool, - that's a conversion I'm going to be fascinated to see CB. :)
Will be a leisurely project due to too much $$ spent on bike stuff recently. I will however post what Im up to with the idea.

Will cool only the cylinder barrel with the water jackets, the head will remain air cooled. Guess its a hybrid system. There are only 5 fins on the cylinder barrel and only 3 of those are usable in the jacketing. They are however pretty deep and will hold a fair amount of water. This area runs a bit hotter anyway due to the fact that the exhaust port has a large cast area that transfers a good bit of heat to the rest of the cylinder. The little radiator is pretty cute, but even as small as it is may be somewhat of a problem to stuff on to the frame.

Plan to build the system while leaving the bike air cooled then swap the system over. Am planning on using a pulse fuel pump for a water pump, it will be in the lower transfer tubes pumping previously cooled water from the radiator. Shouldn't hurt it a bit. The exiting/returning water will enter the cylinders independently via meeting in "Ts" so there is no circulating between cylinders.

This is really not necessary, just something I want to do.
 

cannonball2

Well-Known Member
Oct 28, 2010
3,682
221
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Colonial Coast USA.
I agree on the IGH SB. Being an FD it has a gentle engagement due to some slippage before it finally bites, that's gotta be easy on the internals. Even if you opened it wide open and dumped the clutch its going to slip a bit unloading a lot of torque in the slippage. I think the hub is up to it.
 

Citi-sporter

Active Member
Jun 16, 2014
206
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28
North Bend, Or,
The numerical difference between second and third is bigger than first and second on most bike 3 speed IGH epicyclics, kind of backwards to my thinking.

I also have a Sachs Pentasport 5 speed which duplicates this with first and second being so close together as being almost useless, while the jump from fourth to fifth is a nice spacing accounting for wind resistance and road friction.

I can see why the pointy heads at Shimano redesigned the Nexus 7 so it's ratios are all overdriven from a 1:1 in first gear. But then the Nexus's are pretty fragile, not uncommon for them to grenade in less than friendly use.
 

cannonball2

Well-Known Member
Oct 28, 2010
3,682
221
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Colonial Coast USA.
Citi, my calculations of the hubs gearing have the top two gears at 2nd 1:1 and 3rd a 1.25 overdrive. I have never counted the low gear. All the gears are useable even with the very low HP of this engine. Whats cool is it allows the Maytag to pull a bigger roller than it would with a fixed drive.

L2, I need to post a vid, but will have to recover my user name and password from Youtube, I have long lost them in a password log in the move a few years back. Also sold my GoPro with my quad copter so will have to use a less than stellar camera.
 

Ludwig II

Well-Known Member
Jul 17, 2012
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UK
Go Pro, quad copter, you do realise just a few years ago this would have been James Bond territory?
 
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cannonball2

Well-Known Member
Oct 28, 2010
3,682
221
63
Colonial Coast USA.
Thanks Velodrome!

L2 I started with the quads when they first came out. I built a full house autopiloted FPV/aerial photag machine, learned a lot and had fun. It was sold to a local real estate photographer that uses it for high end house listings. I still fly two lesser quads.

Well the expiration date on the Shimano came in yesterday. After a morning of crusing the neighborhood the hub locked. Took it apart and the pawls had jammed in the hub. fixed it and it soon did it again finally damaging the pawls. The Shimano shifts the pawls in elongated ratchet groves to change speeds, I believe the SA has clutches.I think this is how Shimano got around copy infringements with SA. Will research a bit to find a good SA hub. Have to be sure it will directly fit the mount, I don't think there is a problem though with anything but hub diameter maybe. I expected this from the get go. The S3X on the other 3spd bike seems indestructible, I have long since quit babying it. It would be a good choice for this bike except the $$!
 

silverbear

The Boy Who Never Grew Up
Jul 9, 2009
8,325
670
113
northeastern Minnesota
Sorry to hear that the Shimano died. At least we know and can move on to the older S&A hub. I told you before that I have one and am willing to send it to you as my contribution to "research and development". Let me know if you want it. My payback comes in the form of shared knowledge which may someday lead me to something that will work or save me the trouble of wasting time on something that won't.

Just did an initial look and found the two Shimano hubs and a S&A 3 speed with coaster brake. I'm sure I have the freewheel version, too, but what did I do with it? It is somewhere in me chest of treasures... I'll look some more. The S.A. is heavier and larger diameter and also has the oiler. I don't think the oiler would be a problem if the rubber covering was cut out around the oiler cap to give access.
SB
 

cannonball2

Well-Known Member
Oct 28, 2010
3,682
221
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Colonial Coast USA.
Thanks SB! I would be happy to have an SA for R&D if you are willing to send one. I had wanted to try the Shimano. Im glad I did and now we know. I am going to read on Sheldon Browns site a bit and search for a youtube vid on a tear down to get a bit more knowledge on the SA internals.