What else is better to do in a rainy afternoon then building a 8 speed rear wheel base on the Sturmey Archer X-RF8(W) rear hub?
So this is a very special request from a Brompton rider, he was asking me if we could build a wheelset that contains the most gears that not needing to replace the rear triangle. As we all know the Brompton original triangle was built with a standard width of 112mm, and that aren’t the most common standard in the market.
With a bit of luck, we had a Shurmey Archer X-RF8(W) rear hub sitting in from of us. This rear hub hold 8 gears internally and it weight almost 1.8Kg. Yes, there is a lot of weight in it but it also pack with an overall gear range of 325%.
• Gear 1 – 100% (Direct Drive)
• Gear 2 – 130% (Gear 1 + 30%)
• Gear 3 – 148% (Gear 2 + 14%)
• Gear 4 – 169% (Gear 3 + 14%)
• Gear 5 – 192% (Gear 4 + 14%)
• Gear 6 – 220% (Gear 5 + 14%)
• Gear 7 – 250% (Gear 6 + 14%)
• Gear 8 – 325% (Gear 7 + 30%)
I already had the hub dimension measured the other day, spokes already been cut to the length. So, today will be about building it onto the Brompton double wall rims, simple as that.
