This extract is given complete because it so well describes the regular construction at wheel centres twenty years ago. The gun-metal flange, ordinarily written in English catalogues as “gum hubs,” long ago disappeared; the back wheel, and the non-driven hub of early “safeties” were gum, with the bearing cups pressed into the ends, much as in the present fashion. The driven hub was fastened to the steel axle by “sweating,” aided by a key driven in flush between. In this country the G M hub did not prevail. The Columbia front hub, for example, comes up before the mental eye—a great spool of excessive strength and weight, both threaded and pinned on, so that parting from the axle was not to be thought of. In the present type the driving axle is a third, independent of the wheels, and the wheel hubs are either turned from the solid steel bar or drop-forged from steel, or formed from steel tube, the “bike metal” casting being kept very quiet in this as in other portions, or else reserved for the people who suggest that the cheapest way to procure a bicycle is to buy ready made parts and “build” one’s own.
THE “DIVIDED AXLE.”
Cranks were sometimes shrunk on, sometimes threaded on, and sometimes held on by wedging keys. Of the many ways, the survivors are the transverse key known now as the plain “cotter pin and nut,” and the D-shaped end, the latter being sometimes made like a square with three corners rounded, as recently on the Wolff-American and Remington, for example. A shape quite in vogue now is a tapered round, with one or two sides shaved to a flat and also tapered. Up to the time of the last Garden Show, two years ago, axles had been made in one piece, and the separate cranks had been attached in some of these above-mentioned ways, with a very few exceptions. It may also be said that this was the most ordinary and obvious mode of construction. But at that show appeared a very simple and good specimen of divided axle, the Gard, although not the first, for the [Columbia] had been trying the idea for a year or two, and had set the fashion. For some reason the Gard axle—which was joined at the centre by mortice-and-tenon, each half axle being one piece with its corresponding crank—has not gone much into use. This is probably because makers have desired to have devices of their own; at least, there has since that time been a raging epidemic of “divided axle.” It is quite within bounds to say that at least a page of this journal would be required to intelligently describe and illustrate the manifold devices of perverted and costly ingenuity for cutting the crank axle into two parts and then sticking the sundered parts together again. There are axles cut on single-tenon and on double-tenon; axles with straight bevel, zig-zag bevel, circular-notch lap, and with a long “skived” lap, as if glueing were proposed and a lot of surface were required for a joint; there are sleeves threaded and sleeves not threaded; there are halved hollow axles, to be held together by a screw bolt lengthwise through them. Some of these may perhaps have fallen, together with the makes of which they were a part, in the conflict of last season, but mostly they are still extant. Generally, the division is at or near the centre, but sometimes it is well at one side, thus approaching a more reasonable and quite common form which has axle and one crank in one piece and attaches to them the other crank removably. It is admitted that occasion to remove a crank may occur, and the wearing strain and exposure to dirt are so great on the present crank bracket that some device for detachability is almost necessary; yet only the seeking for peculiarity and the feeling on the part of designers that they must appear to be earning their pay can account for these constructional frenzies which it is not practicable to describe in detail. Here we may say that the Humber still adheres to the ancient and substantial device of separable cranks, held on by the transverse “cotter pin.”
| EXTENSION PEDAL— AMERICAN WALTHAM. | AMERICAN WALTHAM PEDAL. |
STRICT “ONE-PIECE” CONSTRUCTION.
In strong contrast with this may be mentioned the Fauber one-piece construction, by which both the cranks and the axle are made of a single piece, being passed into place endwise into the open bracket, the bearing parts and fastenings being next put on and finally the pedals. This patent is a radical departure in the direction of extreme simplicity and strength, having obviously no chances of getting loose and giving the desired absence of nuts and projections about the bracket ends. It seems to be steadily working its way into use, and it may be easily recognized by the “star” sprocket, which is commonly used, in connection with it, although not a necessary part of it.
Heinz & Munschaur of Buffalo, working under a license from Fauber and some pending patent of their own, describe their own one-piece construction as being from steel of high carbon, and say they will replace any which may be broken from any cause whatever. They fasten the spider to the crank mechanically, not by brazing; the sprocket rim is firmly held, but is readily detachable; the ball cases contain fifteen 5⁄16 balls with retainers, “and fit to a shoulder in the hanger, doing away with any threads, which are liable to give trouble.”