How best to cone hubs and taper axle heads

[tiredndusty]

I am helping my kids with building their cars for our AWANA Grand Prix and want to cone the inner wheel hub and taper the axle head. I don't have any special PWD tools but do have drill press, Dremel, etc.

In trying to cone down an old wheel hub with a file it seemed like all I was going to get was a rough surface that was undesirable. Any tips on how best to cone it.

As to the axle head, if I put it in the drill press and use a file to taper the axle head is this OK or is there a better way?

Thanks

[beakerboysracing]

Tiredndusty,
I'm not to familier with awana wheels but if they are hard plastic like bsa or ra wheels then the best way I have found to cone hubs is the pro hub tool from derbyworx. Its fairly inexpensive and can be purchase from venders such as Derbydocs or Maximum-velocity. I have tried to cone hubs with a razer and made a mess. The pro hub tool with give you a uniform rounded surface to the hub. You would have to have a very steady hand or a lathe to achieve the same results. The problem I see by trying to do it by hand is if you don't get the hub unifomly rounded then when the wheel contacts the body it will cause all kinds of alignment issues(ie wobble) and weird braking effect if there are high spots on the hub. I start out with 220 grit paper cut in long strips(so you can hold paper still) and punch the shaft of the hub tool through the paper. Work until you get a good rounded hub(make sure to use plenty of water and wet/dry paper). Then I get progressively finer(400,800,1000,1500) until the hub is really slick. Then you could polish with micro glaze or plastic polish. Dont forget to polish bore of wheel also(tool available for that as well).
As for the axles, you are doing it right. I use a small triangle shaped file to get the burrs and crimp mark off and to tapper the head. Just be careful not to over file axle as you don't want to take to much material off(ie sloppy fit of wheel to axle). Then polish axles with wet/dry sandpaper. I polish up to 8000 grit on my axles.
Hope this helps
scott

[sporty]

i have some experience with awana wheels, personally they can be a pain. hard to shave well and the surface does ruff up easy. softer plastic than a bsa wheel.

much slower speeds are needed, i have not done well with a dremel either. i went to hand and 800 and up sand paper, 1200 grit seems to work okay, i just take a slow and timely aproach with using the finer grit sand paper to do the work. (hub).

Now shaving the wheels, i had bad luck, I actually recommend the awana speed wheels sold by vendors, for the price its a deal and safes hassle and when you get them, you wont be upset.

Sporty

[kcbcommando]

First, you BSA guys have it made, your wheels are easy to use.
Awana wheels are difficult and BTW you can't narrow them anymore unless you aren't following the rules in the kit. But anyway I have had success putting them in a drill press going as slow as possible. I use wet/dry paper(wet) to round off and modify them. The prohub tool works best if you put the wheel in the freezer for an hour. Just incase you aren't aware the wheels have a 2 degree taper from the inside to the outside. mounted on an axle that's exactly parallel to the racing surface will result in a wheel that rolls on a very small surface!!!!!