General Technical Information about Phil Wood Products

Tech Notes – Hub Manufacturing

·          Hub shells are blanked out on one of our CNC (Computer Numerical Control) lathes.  To produce a hub shell, each is handled 9 separate times.  4 CNC and 5 manual machining operations are performed to produce a hub shell.  Each step has its analytical and esthetic quality standards that must be maintained.  The hub flanges are canted toward the rim by 5 to 7 degrees, depending on the hub.  Spoke holes are placed perpendicular to the surface of the canted flange then coined.  Coining compresses the material around the spoke hole; cold forging a cradle for the spoke head.   After coining, hubs have a mild heat treatment to stress relieve the work hardening from the coining.   The precision boring of the bearing pockets and any other internal machining is then completed.   The signature Phil is then cold forged into the hub shell then the final hand polishing is performed.

Tech Notes – Front Axle Cap Design 

·       The one-piece front axle end caps are machined from surgical quality stainless steel bar.   The caps thread onto the axle and are broached to accept either a 5mm (QR) or 8mm (Bolt) hex wrench.   Front cap contact diameter is19mm for Touring / Tandem / MTB and 15.5mm for Road / Track / BMX.   The Q-R cap has a 9mm diameter tip that securely fits into standard front dropouts.

 Product Notes – Anodizing

·       Custom colors are now available by special order – call for color options and lead times or look on home page under colors. 

Tech Notes – Disc Brake Hubs

·         All disc brake hubs have the International Standard (IS) 6 bolt disc mounts for securing the rotor.   Q-R and Bolt front hubs are used in 100mm front forks.   20mm thru axle front hubs are used in 110mm front forks.  Custom hole patterns and black anodizing upgrade options are available.  SLR option for relieving the Disc side of the flange is available on 130 and 135 Disc Brake rear hubs.

Tech Notes – Hub Axle Design

·         FSA and FSC axles are manufactured from high tensile aluminum, premium aircraft quality chromium-molybdenum steel, or chromium nickel stainless steel.  There are two axle style designs.  One is a shouldered style providing bearing placement with the bearing stop machined on the axle.  The other is a center less ground axle used primarily with our rear cassette hubs providing bearing placement with stainless and alloy sleeves. The ends are threaded to accept threaded end caps.  For bolted axles, as is the case with track and BMX axles, the axle is threaded internally to accept our 8mm x 1.25mm socket head bolts.     A Bolted Axle custom option is available on most models.

Tech Notes – Cog Recommendations / Cautions

·         The use of “stamped” or plated cogs with minimum thread engagement and beyond the normal spec on thread tolerances are not recommended with quality track hubs.  The use of thick cogs should be avoided, as this will limit the important engagement of the lockring.  There is an optimum balance between the amount of thread on the cog and the lockring. Deviation from this balance will result in stripped threads on the hub of either or both.  See the Track Cog section for notes and specifications on cog dimensions.   The thread on our cog is 1.370 x 24 tpi.  This is compatible with most high quality cogs.  Caution should be taken with some cogs marked as ISO thread – the pitch may actually be closer to 1.0mm (25.4tpi) than to 24 tpi.  A simple test is: Thread the cog onto a quality freewheel type hub.  If it easily threads to the freewheel stop, it’s 24 tpi – if it jams before, it may have a metric or other pitch – NOT COMPATIBLE with ours and other quality track hubs.

Tech Notes – Cog Thread Cautions & Cog Material

·         Track hubs have short thread width for the cogs.  Binding may not be as apparent on the track hub as on a Phil freewheel hub.  What occurs is the leading and trailing thread on the cog is binding on the hub thread.  The high stress of sprinting could shear the top of the thread form at the binding points.  The cog slips and binds on fresh thread forms, and so on, until all thread forms have collapsed / stripped.  A compatible hub/cog thread will offer over 32” of shear contact.  Mismatched thread will offer about 4”.    Phil Track cogs are produced from a triple heat-treated material.  We were determined to produce a track cog that was durable, strong, resistant to cracking, resistant to corrosion and heat-treatable.   Heat-treatment was desired so that we could permanently fix the qualities we sought into the cog.  The first heat treatment “normalizes” the material to help verify the actual chemistry of the material.  The second heat treatment stabilizes the material after machining the part.  The third and final heat treatment hardens the teeth of the cog.   The material we selected is a heat-treatable stainless steel.  Not all stainless steels, such as spokes, will respond to heat treatment.  To give you an idea of its quality, the cog material is the same material used in the landing gear of jumbo jet.

Tech Notes – Rear Axle Cap Design

·         The rear axle end caps are machined from bars of heat-treatable stainless steel.   The caps are knurled with a raised serration.  This allows axles to bite into the dropout reducing the likelihood of wheel slippage in both horizontal dropout and disc brake applications. Heat-treating after machining gives the serrations their permanence.   Rear caps have a 19mm contact diameter.  The Q-R caps have a 10mm diameter tip to securely fit into standard rear dropouts.   The standard Kiss-Off single speed rear axle caps have a 25mm contact diameter.

Tech Notes – Cartridge / Cup Features

   Phil  68mm BB Cartridges are compatible with 68, 70 & 73mm shells.   Cartridges for 68mm shells have approximately 2.5mm extending from both sides of the shell.  This allows approximately  +/- 2.5mm of fine tuning for chain line adjustment.   The 68mm cartridge, when used in a 73mm shell will allow the rings to be flush with the shell while still maintaining an adjustable chain line.     Damaged British threads may be tapped to Italian threading on the damaged side only and use a combination of British & Italian cups.    On tours, one tool is practical.  For ease of installation, two tools speed up the install & alignment process.    Phil Wood BB cups must be installed with the supplied Phil  thread / sleeve retaining compound  (TSRB00 or equivalent) when used in steel, aluminum, and titanium bottom bracket shells.

Tech Notes

·    Damaged British threads may be tapped to Italian threading on the damaged side only and use a combination of our British & Italian cups. 

Tech Notes – Hub Shell Material

·          Hub shells are produced from bars of cold finished proprietary 6000 series aluminum produced in our designated Midwestern U.S. mill.    The tight grain structure of the cold finished alloy used in the hub shells provides two special advantages.  The first is to provide a lifetime warranty on the hub shell against breakage due to this material and our workmanship.  The other is to produce a hub shell capable of our trademark hand polished finish.   This material enables us to offer a high gloss black anodize finish as a custom option on most hub models.