Freehub Body Disassembly/Assembly 

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The interwebs is a magical thing, isn't it!? Some bloke who calls himself RJ made a video long time ago, in a far away land where people speak english, about the exact thing i need to do today, 8 yrs later, over here where people don't speak english, and BAM! I can do the thing. Cause of 8-years-in-the-past RJ. Didn't even cost me a dime. Didn't even have to leave my house. Magic.

So comforting to know there are still those who know and care about repair and reuse. You’re a gem.

Wow. Exactly what I was after. Park tools who? GCN huh? RJ the bike guy has the premium content

Use a straw to install bearings. A thin one like a soap pump pack stem. Add some grease so they dont roll out and a skewer to push them through like a syringe.

It's an old video, but I just wanted to let you and others know that there is no missing pawl in your case (time code 4:10), it's supposed to be like this: 2 pawls, located asymmetrically in special groves, and the 3rd empty grove, which is different from the previous two. This 3rd groove is shallow and cannot hold a pawl, it's designed to give the spring ring some freedom of movement . And if somebody is wondering, there are 25+25 3mm ball bearings. BTW, this particular Shimano freehub body is 30M-98010, and it fits freehub assembly FH-RM40-7speed as well as FH-MC10-7speed. They are not produced anymore, so servicing them is the way to go.

5 years ago and you're still a life saver! Especially now, that getting new freehub is riddiculously expensive in my country.

You’re a legend. Using your videos I was able to get me free hub working smoothly again! I only have old bikes as that’s what I can afford, so it’s great to see someone supporting them. Instead of a socket I used a piece of flat steel bar cut to size, and a shifter, and it worked. Also there are only two sets of pawls in my hub, must be a cost saving thing....

Your video helped me tremendously. I've been searching for a video like this for a while now and none have showed this much detail. Thank you for posting.

RJ discovered your channel yesterday. Cannot express how helpful it is. Right now I am working on hubs for the first time, but scanning over the playlists, I see answers to questions I have had since high school. Thank you!!

Not just interesting and useful, but the ONLY video on YT showing the whole procedure from start to finish. In a helpful manner! :-) NO bikeshops in my local area has been able to work out how to get into the freehub body... "Too old..." apparently. Another fab video to (finally!) save my day. Now I just need to put it back together and hope that the initial 1mm wobble has gone to sleep with the fishes. Have a great 2018 Sir and keep up the Superbly good work!

Just what i needed to know. Excellently edited and perfect for the home mechanic. Lets have more and thank you 👍.

Great Video! Once again RJ, you’ve have shown me how to do something to a bike that I’ve always wondered how it was done. I even was able to make a new tool (from an old 13/16th socket) for servicing cassette hubs by watching your other video. I can’t thank you enough.

Another great video for my "Bicycle repair/maintenance"collection. Thanks again, RJ!!

Great video. It was very helpful. I recently purchased a new wheel for a 1x conversion. The hub was sticky and got progressively worse. I followed your video for guidance and now have a functioning bike again.

Thanks for this very helpful video to take the old free hub apart, as the local bike shop said it was too old and no replacement, and just wanted to replace the whole wheel.

Mr. RJ, I'd like to thank you very much for posting these videos... I was BAD confused about freehubs and freewheels and cassettes... I've always had freewheels on all my bikes since the beginning of Time... A buddy brought me a cassette/freehub wheel that spins both directions... I had to consult the Great Googler, and I was sent here to attend your "class"... I've got them straight in my brain matter now... Thank You...

Sir, you're a lifesaver! Let's take a moment to appreciate this hero's content!!

Your Channel is awesome! I'm from Brazil and there is no channel like yours here. You always help me with the maintencd of my bike. Thank you so much!

This and all the vids are fantastic...just overhauled two freehub bodies today after creating the tool...Awesome!

Found this video very interesting I really admire you’re patience, I suppose by using the right process of dismantling and putting back together in the right order even though you had to fashion & engineer you’re own tooling to get the job done, I just wouldn’t have the patience.Thanks for the instruction and the upload🔥.

ooh i see now, when i got the hub off all the bearings fell down so first i thought there were 2 rings filled with total 50, but now i see were to place them, thanks alot, this was the right video for me ! fixed it and all together again, nice

Oh your channel is a wonderful resource! Thanks for posting!

Video tutarial good also for my Cannondale trail 4. Yesterday I did the job, and this morning I rode 70 km without problems. Thank you friend, from Italy!

Thank you so much for the very instructive video. You saved me from having to buy a new freehub

Wow thank you so much! It's really precise and you're the only one that shows how to do it and how to make the tool. Of course the local bike shops were not helpful, saying "oh you should contact the manufacturer" (except to provide the odd size 11mm allen key needed to unscrew the freehub body on my bike).

I have to watch this video everytime I do this. Thanks for each time it's come in handy.

50 dislikes? What type of complaint could one possibly have about this extremely useful and well made video? Well done RJ The Bike Guy! I’ve trawled everywhere to find a video explaining how to disassemble a sealed freehub body and finally seen the light. Reading some of the other comments I’m guessing it might be worth just spend the £22 for a new one but I think I’ll have a go just for fun. Cheers dude! Keep making the vids...:)

You are making my work much easier with this kind of freewheel which I faced with recently. Sincerely yours from North Afghanistan.

Thank you RJ, U have made it a greener world for all.

Im so glad that i found your video demonstration. Thank you very much for the illustrations.

Thank you so much! Your videos are absolutly great and helpful. Excatly what i was looking for to repair one of my "loved " Retro MTBs. Thought i had to buy a new freewheel hub which is some kind of no name OEM type on my bike. I couldn't find adequate type so far. .But after following your instructions it clicks 'n clicks,...again. Saved me time and money. Now i' am going to overhaul old cassette whith integrated free hub i 've got still on stock.. Thanks again . Great job!

This is a brilliant video. my Giant defy 0 has this freehub, the bike is a 2016 model on the PR-2 wheel and this video means I can overhaul the freehub. Nice one RJ. Legend

Very informative and much needed right now. Thanks for the detailed explanation 👍

I just repaired my freehub, I am working in a Specialized Stumpjumper 97 rebuild project, it was so helpful. Saludos desde México

Brilliant video it absolutely saved me this morning and educated me for the future

great vid. extremely helpful. my freehub is now stripped and awaiting 3mm bearings to be delivered. I couldnt find the correct allen key to fit the retaining bolt but found the extension bar from my socket set was a good fit and released the bolt no problem. cheers

Excellent video RJ. This convinced me not to mess around with these; I'll just buy a complete hub and have that as my spare freehub part.

brilliant vid mate i have got a road bike i have not been able to use for about 6 years and this is the reason why , it started to lose grip on the pawls slowly but in the end became a waste of time . i used to repair my freewheels when i was a kid but with the new setup i just could not work out how to do it but now i will try and make that tool and sort it ! THANKS BUD keep up the good work

Great video. Have done this repair now on 2 of my bikes without a problem. I was looking into making a tool to disassemble the freehub like RJ but I didn’t have a spare socket to sacrifice but found you can get a purpose made tool for eBay for around £3 from China. Just had to touch the edges with a file and it worked perfectly.

I just got a bike with a wobbly freehub, with help from your videos I'm happy to dismantle to see what's going on - Hopefully just that hex bolt came loose. Thanks once again RJ

Just did this disassembly with this video right here as my instructions. Never done this operation before. Worked like a charm. Cleaned the whole thing and now i'm sitting here with a coffee to watch this video yet again to make sure i put all the bits and bobs back where they need to go. XD Thanks for making this video, RJ! (Bonus success: I still have all 50 of those tiny ball bearings, can i get a high five for that?) ^^

Thank you so much for this video! I didn't realize the cone bearing nut was reverse threaded so I started looking in youtube and you fixed me!! My freewheel didn't look quite as bad but was stuck nonetheless

Thanks for the detailed video, I thought mine was seized, followed your instructions, cleaned it, rebuilt ...... saved over £75.......

Nice video, planning to change my freehub and repack its bearing. This vid just gave me a wide overview.Thanks

Hey R.J. I've always put grease on the pawls and not had any stick over the last 45-50yrs even on the old free wheel blocks with the cats whisker springs, e.g. Campagnolo record. It does make them run a lot quieter when free wheeling.

Very helpful video series, really appreciate !

Very helpful video thank you, just finished test run after doing this service and it works now. It looks harder than it is, though mine was in better condition to start with. Also my similar Shimano hub had only two paws as well. Note that i did have no tools to make that "special" tool, i was able to open it with regular needle nose pliers.

massively helpful as the rest of your vids, much appreciated!! :-D

cheers for the video! been looking for this for quite a while

you are amazing...love your videos...so often the only thing i can find and I have to say that these are awesome and so helpful...thanks

You wouldn’t even understand how helpful this was it’s even the same fh-m475 hub

This is exactly what I was looking for...thank you so much!

compact, concise, quality, ty again for a great video!

It's been 8 years now and now is september 11, 2022 you help me a lot from this video you made...thank you so much...greetings from phillipines🇵🇭

Hey, I saw in another of your videos where you no longer use grease to lube the internals of a free hub. You now use Phil Wood Tenacious Oil, or similar. You did, however use grease for the placement of the first 25 bearings, then had to wash it out and oil from the exterior. I tried using the oil directly. I placed oil in the lower race and carefully placed the first 25 bearings in the oil. The oil held them nicely. I was also able to directly oil the pawls and the interior of the outer free hub body. Just seemed to be a bit easier than using grease, washing it out, and dribbling oil inside. Anyway, like you, I always look for ways to improve and make things easier. I really enjoy watching your videos!

Informative video. An alternative to the socket mod to disassemble the freehub. My inside diameter was about 30mm (1-1/8") on my Serengeti. So I had in my shop an old 1-1/8" spade bit which fit the diameter perfectly. Blade was about 2-2.5mm thick, so slid right into notches in retaining ring. I ground the bit cutting edges back, to remove tapered edges, until I was back to the original bit thickness of 2.5mm. Then just inserted it into the retainer and used an adjustable wrench to hold and turn the blade to break the ring free.

Old skool maintenance, well done sir

Excellent production and demo. Well done thank you!

It’s amazing how much of a pain more antiquated rear hubs are to deal with. Modern hubs offer much more in terms of engagement and the ease of serviceability.

Very helpful indeed, keep it up RJ!

Count me among the legion of subscribers who made their 3/8" socket custom removal tool and now rebuild freehubs as their value and purpose make it economically worthwhile to service.

Thank you for this, I could not find a freehub for my old 1999 Xt hub. I was able to grease it up and put new bearings and get a little more life out of it.

My old freehub is somewhat grindy and happend that I have to wait till next month for a new one. Thnx to RJ my freehub is running decently again, and, with any luck, it will do its job keeping me rolling until the new one arrives. …and this goes straight into my MTB maintenance playlist, for future reference.

Thank for you that specific procedure and now I know what they looks like inside. Pretty sure most Shimano Freehub body shares similar structure which should be the same for mine too.

Thanks for the video RJ, finally I can Disassembly/Assembly some freehub body just feel so satisfied since I always want to do this. Not shimano though but more ore less still the same loose ball bearing freehubs.

Thann you for tour vidéos ! Exactly what i needed! Altough i broke the end of my screwdriver in the freehub.. Didn't get that there wasn't a ruber ring on mine. Manage to pull it out after many hours hoping i hadn't broke it. :).

thin spacer was bent and was under bearing-track making clonk-sound. Thank you for video. I managed to count all bearings and put back just by hand ;) Dust-cap was loose, so no tools needed. one tongue was flipped over, so I put both tongues back after cleaning. I filed one 15 mm key to tighten bearing-cone, it was easier to assemble with screw-bench.

Very useful info. Thanks for posting!

Excellent assembly. Thank you very much a complete explanation.

I have a similar freehub on one of my wheels, it was weird when i see just 2 springs, actually everything on it was new for me: 50 tiny bearings, 4 spacers, very tiny room for every piece inside, 10 thumbs up for your videos

Very helpful. I enjoy your videos. Thanks.

Thank you very much for that video! I was keen on finding out if I could fix the tightened poles using your instruction. Due to not beeing accurate this took several hours. But at the end I made it. Nevertheless I would take the following advice of my "bicylce repair man" to avoid that action: "Instead just put some thin oil into the appropriate parts and wait. It'll be fine after a few hours. If you couldn't resist and have already disassemled the freehup avoid using too much grease". Furthermore there wasn't a shop to get these tiny 2.38 mm balls so I had to use the old rusty ones. Well, anyway I've learned a lot.

thanks dude you're a great Mechanic man

Thank you so much for this video. It's great to repair stuff rather than replace. I'm going to try oil in the mechanism instead of grease as grease caused the original sticking I think! Thanks again.

Thanks for this useful video buddy! Regards from Brazil

A really good video RJ.

Good work, with details. Salute of Argentine

Clockwise to loosen! You saved me a lot of cursing. Anyhoo I mulled about making the cup removing tool and figured it would be more time/cost/hassle than the toasted freehub was worth, - but thanks.

Thanks RJ. I learned alot.

thank you !! exactly what i was looking for

I just disassembled one. Also only two pawls. Same self made tool. Thanks! p.s. my dust cap came out with a gentle pull using finger pressure only

Thanks, such an excellent video!

Thank you so much! You are my hero!

I only came because I need to know which key I use to remove the body, but I loved the video, good job friend

Nice video. I've serviced a ton of these. Always keep a pack of 1/8" balls handy in case you loose some. Plus a couple times opening the Shimano ones, I found they were missing a few balls from the factory.

Had to laugh when you opened the unit up and the ballbearings dropped out all over the table. We’ve all been there buddy! :-) Enjoyed the video and like you the way you made your tool. Best regards from the UK.

thank you very much!! this is what I'm looking for!!!!

Really helpful video. Thanks.

Lifesaver, thank you!

Thanks for the great videos. I made the tool and took apart my noisy Shimano Freehub. It only had two pawls too. One was broken though. I had new 1/8" ball bearings, so I put it back together with only one pawl. We'll see if it stands up to the torque of my ebike.

thanks! tomorrow i will do my first!

Very good video, well done.

Great explanation, I was successful. Thank you, Sir.

Thanks. Superb explanation.

Awesome. Just about to have a crack at this as a wheel bearing in a bike l have just bought has shattered (into two pieces, possibly three) and is catching internally within the hub itself...l think🌝 Two months ago l could never of even diagnosed or even considered such a task if it was not for your video's. THANK YOU SO MUCH. Your videos are absolutely brilliant, l have studied them intensely for the past two months and have applied them to my first total rebuild of an old Diamond Back. My first bike build for almost 50 years. It was unbelievable to see the wife ride off on it...She came back though. 😄😄😄 Now I'm totally hooked. Went out and bought a beat up Giant as my next project. Man, I love being retired. Once again, thanks so much, your efforts are much appreciated...

Excelent! really helpful!

Interesting that I found this video only after going through a freehub rebuild and making the identical tool, using (you guessed it) a 13/16" Taiwan socket. Note that the shim/washers under the cone/cup are for adjusting the bearing tightness, so I was able to remove the thinnest one of the four shims and so ended up with a tighter (yes, tighter) bearing adjustment. You could also adjust it tighter by sanding down the cone slightly where it contacts the shims, in case there is no shim that is the right thickness to remove without causing binding. I also use blue Loctite on the fine threads in the cone, running the cone in a couple of times and wiping oil out of the threads each time. Note also that there are many variations of the Shimano-built freehub bodies. Many of the parts do not interchange between them, and using the wrong body sometimes moves the cassette mounting away from it's proper position on the hub. One can also get oil into the freehub body bearings and pawls (after removing the axle) by running the oil behind the dust shield in the outer freehub body shell (15 drops) and then slowly tilting the body to allow the oil to run in behind the cone/cup part of the freehub body (although excess grease added there sometimes prevents the oil from ever getting past the cone). On the cheaper ones (without rubber seals), I oil those with the wheel held horizontal, I squirt light oil in between the freehub body and the spokes, and wait for it to run down into the freehub body. These freehub bodies work well with just oil (note, WD40 is not oil), so disassembling to add grease is not really necessary. I only ever took mine apart to adjust worn freehub body bearings tighter.

Thank you! Well explained.

Thanks it was a very useful video