Taking that apart wasn't so easy - took me about an hour of thinking and doing. If anyone knows an easier approach, please speak up. Here's the illustrated story of gear removal.
I began with this set. First step is to remove the axle. Photos before and after.
Note the spacer projecting from the gear. This is for clearance for the intermediate gear.
Now the problem is separating the gear from old wheel. You can see the square hole in the gear is obscured by the expanded casting. So with my King Kut knife and a file I removed enough to make the whole square visible. The idea was that the square part of the casting would pop out when the gear is removed - didn't happen.
The time consuming difficulty was removing the gear. There wasn't any obvious way to get between the gear and the wheel to pry it off. After messing around with a chisel, I tried an abrasive cutting disk on my Dremel tool. Could have saved time if I'd thought of that first. I was able to dig a slot between the back of the gear and the casting to insert a small cold chisel. Finally it popped off.
Thefirst photo shows wheel and gear. Note that square part of the wheel casting broke off and stayed in the gear. Easy to pop off but note the gear center is not square. A bit of work with the knife and file and I've got a gear with a square hole ready to mount on the MEW wheels.
Still one mystery - where did that spacer go ? I had expected a washer, but it seems to have disintegrated with the casting. I would suppose that a 1/16 washer with a hole the diameter of the axle would work. Any advice on that ?
So now I will order that MEW spoked wheel set for my 252.
Malcolm Laughlin
