Sometimes you try new things and wonder if you decided wisely to divert from a proven path. The new ball-joints for Miffi certainly gave me an entire evening to think about it. But let’s start where I left yesterday evening. Quite a bit of dirt still had to be removed from the swivel hubs. Sand collected in the grease channels – even though I had the old ball joints installed for blasting and coating.
After they seemed good enough the races for the Timken bearings went in. A set of old races that are a tiny bit smaller come in handy for this. The sound of the hammer clonk changes when they are fully seated. I had Swifttune hardened spacers but decided to stick with the one included in the timken set. The Comma bearing grease I have used for the last few years was empty – so I switched to the Redline CV2. This is a high temp grease also suited for bearings.
All of this was smooth sailing. The challenging part was the new ball-joints. There are no instructions included in the box. After a quick search I found the Japanese website. But I the translated steps are not really complete in my opinion. Like the standard ball joints a 1-1/2inch (or 38mm) dome-nut is required to fasten them to 102Nm. But this doesn’t have the rubber boots installed. These in turn are secured with spring rings. Removing the lower one is required in order to remove the rubber.
As my grease gun failed packing the swivel hub and ball joint with grease was the best option. Before applying the required torque I screwed on new grease nipples. This way the grease is pushed out thru the joint. Installing the stupid spring ring however requires a Japanese Zen session. It also killed my finger nails as I wanted to avoid a metal tool in order not to damage the rubber. What worked is using a plastic pry tool to push one the end piece of the spring. But it is fiddly.
Sure – the second swivel hub went quicker. And maybe with practice – these are also easy to install. But this time it took me more time than finding the right shims. That being said: these do not require shims. The springs and plates for the standard joints are removed. But the joints need grease. Lots of it. With this applied they should last much longer than the standard one – which I had to replace three times in 8 years.
Are the Mini-Delta worth the additional costs? Questionable – I guess I will find out.
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