Multiple Width Bennett, RTS Trucks

[flannelman]

well, i just got a counterbore last week. i've been facing my truck, and i realized, that i could cut my bennett 5.0 and my Tracker 129 down, keeping the axle in place. i would then have a set of space-able trucks. i cut off 1cm on each side, planing on using a bearing spacer to space out the wheels. mu bennett 5.0 is now 105mm wide, and space-able to 125mm, just 2mm smaller than originally. i can even flip my wheels and give myself a narrower track if i need to. my tracker RTS is now 110mms wide, and spaces out to 130mm. this was really easy to do. i've been wanting to do this for some time.

the first thing i did was buy counterbore from ebay, for 30 after shipping. its a cheap one, but it worked. i then marked with a res sharpie the 1cm line on either side. its is much easier to do that then find the middle and divide. its already symmetrical, so i worked with that.

i went out to my shop, put the counter bore in my wood lined vice, chucked the hanger in a drill, put some wd40 on the axle and face, and spun away. i did this to one side only. you see, i have a drill press, but the counterbore, and hanger did not fit into the vice i have for the press. when i worked on one side, it fit. then so after i made it almost to the red, i worn into my garage chucked the hanger in the press, the bore in the vice, and slowly cut away until the red line disappeared. then flipped it over and did the same.

i ran into two problems when doing this.
1. tracker have kerneled axles, like a bennett kingpin. i ran into about a 6mm section on one on one side. when i did to fix this is i viced the hanger down, took a slam metal file, and slowly took the kerneled part down to the size of the axle.

2. the facing where the inner bearing racer meets was not flat. when i took off this much metal, so of it stick to the axle, still connected to the hanger. using the same file, on its side, i slowly cut that aluminum off, and a couple of turns by hand with the counter bore, and it was all clean.

i tried to locate a 5mm spacer. i though skatekings still had them, but they dont. i would have been able to have three widths if i had some of those.

i'll have pictures of the entire process later. i am getting some indy 129s in the mail. i am going to do this to them as well, and run one with a cindy 0* plate as a back truck. when you de-wedge, you add tons of unnecessary height to your truck. i should be able to get away with just a quarter inch riser, instead of using 2 khrio soft wedges. i practiced on the tracker first because it was the least expensive. i now have two tuck in one. and on a slalom deck with a wide arrangement of wheelbases, this will kick ass.

now to build a slalom deck for these bad boys

[Gary in VA]

If you are looking for some 5mm spacers check with your local bicycle shop. Ask for chainring spacers.