Customer Reviews

Pyramid Bicycle Loose Ball Bearings 3/16" Bag Of 144

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What is there to say beyond that these are grade 300 (or thereabout) cheap cost-effective good-enough bearing balls for general-purpose bicycle applications?

I'll give it a try: I wouldn't use them in a turbine engine or something like that but for a typical non-racing ordinary commuting or pleasure bicycle they are plenty fine for the limited RPMs and loadings. Better ball bearings would shave a little bit of friction off and if you are a racer and want those last few watts of power then you will spend the big money on grade 5 ceramics. And by big money I mean BIG MONEY. This is totally wasted unless you are that top level where a tiny fraction of an advantage is going to make the difference of winning or losing by a few feet over miles of racing. But there are slightly better bearings than these for a bit more money but the cost/benefit ratio gets pretty steep and rather quickly.

For this price a home mechanic can afford to buy a couple bags of each common size and always have some on hand for the next project. When I pull apart bearings I just throw the old balls away rather than messing around cleaning and inspecting them. That's the beauty of cheap bearings and these bearings are beautiful. Just don't look at them under 30x magnification or you might be shocked. Under magnification they aren't so beautiful :-D But they work fine. This is bicycle mechanics, not rocket science. Good enough for your mother-in-law's bike. And if you want nicer bearings you can always pay more for them. But for most applications on normal bicycles these are just right.

If you do hub maintenance, you'll find that when you remove the lock nut and cone race, you'll find the ball bearings. Now, some people are cheap and wash the ones they have and put them back in. That makes NO sense to clean everything up and use old parts. They will have small pits and scratches, and no lube will fix that. So, why not replace the 20 3/16th bearings in the front hub with new bearings? You do this once a year, so the $1 is not a huge expense when you consider that it makes your wheels spin like new. These are hardened steel and hold up very well. When I replaced them last time, I looked with a magnifying glass and found only superficial scratches, meaning they worked as expected. Of course, use lube generously when installing them.

For the rear hub, you'll likely need 18 of the ¼" bearings, so be sure to use the proper size for the correct hub. Always count the # that come out and replace it with the same #. While it may LOOK like you can fit one more bearing in, do NOT do that. It's almost universally true that front hubs use 10 per side, while rear hubs use 9 per side (of the ¼", that is).

If you're not into servicing hubs yourself, be sure to tell you local bike shop you want them to service them and replace the bearings. Otherwise, they'll save money by cleaning up the old ones and reinstalling them, and that just is not good enough for serious cyclists.

Rebuild two bicycle wheels with this bearings. Wheels roll smooth. same or better quality then the bearing I replaced. Would purchase again.

I was happily able to buy a couple sizes of these (144 each) for as much as I could buy 25 of one size any place else after shipping. Quality seems just fine for general purpose applications and they're good to have around.

FYI, grease (if you need some) is one of the very few products that seems to be cheaper in stores (presumably because of shipping).