Spinning Wheel Tune-up

Upon moving my Ashford traditional out of the living room and into the dining room taking the place of my daughter's easel (which has moved up to her room), I noticed that everything was, well, how should I put it - shaky. The wheel itself looked like it just might fall apart. The spokes were loose and the hub was coming apart as well. After admonishing my son for not keeping his hands off of it and hearing tales of other children wildly spinning the wheel unsupervised, I went to the google and found this page. My very question of how to repair the wheel spokes and hub was answered, although it took a pdf (found on the ashford site) of how to put one together in order to figure out how to take it apart.

There is a pin in the hub that must be pulled out (we used a pliers) and then you may pull out the shaft, and lift out the wheel. Upon doing this, all you need is a little wood glue and a clamp or two. Wait 30 minutes or so and reinstall. Here's a note though, make sure that the drive band is positioned correctly when you reinstall the wheel. If you don't do this, you may have to take the whole thing apart again to get the drive band on correctly. Take a wild guess as to why I know this!

We (Julius was my eager assistant the whole time - he is going to be such the engineer) then oiled it up, realigned the wheel and the bobbin drive, and tightened some screws. I think it'll be ready for a spin (yes, pun intended) tomorrow evening!