Putting a wheel axle back together

Question

I've been trying to fit a new freehub/freewheel (Bontrager) onto my (BTwin) wheel. The freehub is on, but for the life of me I can't figure out the order of nuts for the skewer bolt. I've put everything together once and noticed on the cassette side the bolt wasn't poking out far enough to clear the cassette's cogs. I've numbered the parts to make it a little easier;

The wheel with the new Freewheel/freehub unit;

Answer 1

Changing cassette shouldn't require you to pull the axle (4) from the hub body.

To get all this put back together you're going to need at least 1 15mm or 17mm (depending on hub) cone wrench and a little bit of know-how.

I would assemble what you have there as 4-6-9-6-5 starting from the inside. The tricky part is getting the locknut (5) tight against the rest without upsetting the load on the bearings.

• Start by tightening the cone (4) against the bearings the the amount you want, no play, but not tight.
• Then hold the cone still with a cone wrench and the opposite cone and locknut still with another wrench.
• Add the washers.
• Tighten the locknut against the whole assembly with either another cone wrench or an open ended wrench of the correct size (some locknuts are too small to manage this).

This is all much easier on the none drive side unless you have the tool to pull the freehub apart.