My first Sturmey Archer AW Can of worms.

[nortonguy]

Was never a fan of 3-speed equipped bikes, which may be one of the reasons I gave a neighbor of mine a '63 Schwinn Tiger that was a barn-find equipped with the Sturmey Archer AW. Of course the darn rear hub turned out to not be functional, and feeling bad for the neighbor, I said "sure I will get it working for you.". That was right before winter last year so the rear wheel with it's shift lever attached sat in my freezing garage until this spring, when I had time to take it apart to see what was going on.

Initially I thought I was going to hit this thing with some WD40 and be done, but I ended up taking the whole hub apart and finding a broken gear in it, and whatever lube was in it was hard and glued all the pawls closed so they were not working. So it all came apart and I cleaned every single part of the hub guts with scrapers, brushes and kerosene. Then I noticed all the spokes were loose in the wheel, one spoke was missing, others were rusty enough I could not get the nipples off. So now the whole wheel is apart, and I am buying a gear, new spokes and nipples, cleaning the rusty rim with a brass brush, buying new pawl springs, bearing cone lock washers and a few other parts.

Today I finally got all the worms back in the can, the hub is back together and laced into the rim. I have to make a short screw to plug up the hole where the oil cap was that broke off. Now I can put it on a bike, true up the rim, put on the tire and make sure the shift leaver is adjusted, get it on the neighbors bike, make sure it is working perfectly and be done with it except hopefully see him riding the bike around the hood with his wife, who I also gave an early 60s Schwinn cruiser to so they could ride together. That is the dream.

 

[SirMike1983]

Frozen pawls, chipped gear teeth, and broken pawl springs are relatively common on older AW hubs that have not been properly maintained. The WD40-only washout method is OK for a hub kept in good shape and where the user refuses to take it apart. I take apart, wash, and rebuild all my AW hubs. Occasionally there will be hidden issue that a simple function test will not reveal. Hubs that show signs of improper adjustment, improper lubrication (heavy grease or no lubrication), or which have continuing issues should be taken apart, totally cleaned, and damaged parts replaced. The best thing for these hubs is an ultrasonic cleaner with small parts baskets, which make cleaning and inspection fairly straightforward.