Cones

[Shoogle]

I was doing a rear hub service and when I looked at the cones, one half of the cone is pitted and the other is fine. How would this happen? The other cone looks normal. I can't remember which side of the hub each cone came off.

[Brucey]

when you see very wide tracks like that and scuffs on one side of some cones this makes me think that the hub bearings were run loose for a while.

The loose running can be as harmful as being set overly tight; the ball bearings scuff instead of roll and this is damaging to the cones. Any scuffing can be worse on the right side of the rear hub if you run in low gears because of the chain tension loads.

On the other hand it may be that the grease got washed out, or that one cone wasn't as well made as the other....

BTW the cones are not identical (the seal rings are in differernt places) so it should be possible to work out which side they came from.

cheers

[Mick F]

Cones don't rotate in use, therefore the load-bearing area will wear more than the non load-bearing area. The load-bearing area will be the bottom-most bit of the cones.

Usually, the most worn cone will be on the drive side of the rear hub. Fronts tend to wear evenly and less of course.

[NATURAL ANKLING]

Hi,
They are early shimano seals fitted to Altus MTB hubs etc, which are two rubber / plasticy split washers.
You see also shiny wear on the plain OD of cone also.
Was it running loose
Left one is freehub side I think.