Weight Weenies

The plate is glued on, but it's shaped like the largest cog and fits inside it. Once it's assembled on the hub it can't slip.

Weeracerweenie, just soak it in acetone for a couple days. It will literally fall apart on its own. The acetone will turn red, but it doesn't remove the red annodizaton from the back plate.

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interesting... cheers man! ill give it a go then hit it with the mill at school!

veganeric wrote:The plate is glued on, but it's shaped like the largest cog and fits inside it. Once it's assembled on the hub it can't slip.

Then how do you glue it back on?

Diamond cut off wheels are the recommended tool of choice via Dremel's website for this.
Would it be possible to fashion the cassette in a mount, secure that with a table vice, and dremel away on the back plate?

Having openings on the backside may help reduce noise as well?

I like your thinking prendrefeu, noise reduction because it lets the noise escape out of the cassette? im thinking old freehub in the vice, mount the cassette on it back to front (the lock ring is on the big cog) then rip into it...

Prendrefeu, I haven't reassembled mine yet. I was going to try putting it together without glue. Like I said, once it's tightened on the hub it should hold together. My one concern is that the back plate will bend inward (on the wheel) under load and allow the cassette to spin. If this happens I'll glue it together with some superglue (also soluble in acetone). I've thought about trying red loctight too. I'll take some pictures of the disassembled cassette when I'm home.

awesome, some pics of your work would be helpful! Cheers

Here is a backplate I recently tuned out. It is from a SRAM Red (2011? 2010? Whatever?) 11-28 Cassette. I ended up getting the older version of the SRAM cassette instead of the 2012 version because: a) 11-28 was hard to find for 2012 b) I wanted 11-28 since most of the ultra events can have painful climbs around 180mi into it c) I found a new one on the cheap, it was worth the $150US cost savings from a 2012 version d) I like climbing a lot, especially the stupid steep stuff. The goal was a little weight loss - which did happen, but nothing substantial to write home about - and to open up the backplate in hopes that the echo-chamber of the cassette would be a little quieter. I won't know of this effect until it is installed and ridden.



Method: remove backplate (described earlier in the thread by the Végàn, Eric), then I made a pattern to follow based off of a SRAM XX cassette's largest cog, printed that pattern out, made it a stencil, outlined onto the backplate the pattern I wanted cut, then started cutting using a few tools (carbide cutter and occasional cut off blades). For the cutting portion I used a series of bolts and large washers to hold the backplate steady, parallel and off the working table. I then sandblasted the backplate to clean it up a little bit.



Could I have done a better job? Yes, definitely.
Am I a professional rotary tool master? No, not at all.
Am I ok with the results? Yes, definitely.
Could you do a better job than I did? Probably.

I am still debating whether I want to polish it or not. At the moment I have a "dremel" polishing kit heading towards me, and this may be a good area for practice/technique before I start polishing other smaller parts. But if I drop this cassette into an ultra-sonic cleaner with some degreaser in the tank, would the polish get removed? Might as well find out.

The pattern I used is attached as a JPG file. Apparently I can't attach PDFs on this forum?

thats a really nice job prendrefeu! what was the original weight of the object? 19 grams seems pretty light for that bit! im curious on the noise reduction, although i can tune mine so it is resaonably quiet while running, but its still noisy when changing gear etc. Very cool job though! i like it!

I don't know off the top of my head. I measured it once but did not photograph it for records (must have been too busy to think straight at the time).
I'm guessing it was originally 25g or so. So an estimated net loss of 6g.
It isn't a huge loss of weight for the cassette overall, but that was not my goal necessarily - getting it to look interesting and possible sound improvement was the goal.

Once I re-assemble and ride it I'll know if I made the sound issue better or worse!

Let us know, how was it putting it together and what did you use (glue, solder?) once you are done.

Sent from my PG86100 using Tapatalk 2

yeah im in agreeance... i might continue with mine (havent touched mine in a month!) but test for noise level before and after, and obviously weigh before and after too...

So a little update (thanks for the bump wee-weenie) - it seems like the tuning of the rear plate has helped a little bit with the sound. The cassette certainly isn't any louder than any other cassette that I can tell, and by comparison to a normal pre-2012 SRAM Red Cassette it is a bit quieter.

All said, if I got my hands on another pre-2012 RED Cassette I would do this again.

thanks prend, fire up them dremels