Howard Sutherland has kindly granted permission for sheldonbrown.com to post the Handbook of Coaster Brakes and Internally Geared Hubs online. It covers hubs produced 1960-1992 -- some still in production.

Also included here by permission are "lost pages" intended for Chapter 16 of the 6th (1996) Edition of Sutherland's Handbook for Bicycle Mechanics but never before published. For now, Shimano 4-speed hubs. To come: Shimano 7-speeds, and Sachs/SRAM 5-speeds and 7-speeds. The documents are draft versions, and some include John Allne's editing suggestions.

The Handbook sections are stored as PDF files. Inside those files, mousing over the icon shown at the right will reveal added information.

About the Handbook

Since before 1980, Sutherlands' Handbook for Bicycle Mechanics has been an invaluable resource on bicycle parts compatibility, repair and maintenance. The 7th edition and the classic 6th Edition are available from Sutherland Publications.

The Handbook of Coaster Brakes and Internally Geared Hubs is now out of print, but available on this site. The Handbook provides very detailed information on these hubs, with exploded drawings, parts interchangeability lists, and disassembly/reassembly instructions.

Replacement parts for many of these hubs are no longer available from the manufacturers. That is not nearly as difficult a problem as it used to be, thanks to the Internet. Spare parts and spare hubs may be located through Internet searches and eBay, or may be as close as your local bike shop.

This site also provides information on most coaster-brake and internal-gear hubs not covered in Sutherland's -- more recent hubs as well as older ones all the way back to the original 1902 Sturmey-Archer three-speed. To locate this information, start with the pages:

• Coaster brakes
• Internal-gear hubs