Singlespeed & Fixed Gear - no name vs brand name cogs?

Can anyone tell me any real differences between no name cogs (like those sold by e.g. Ben's Bike) and name cogs? I want to experiment with my gearing with 17 and 18 tooth cogs in 3/32, and I didn't find anything in Philly at the handful of shops I went to (lots of 1/8). I'm at 53x20 right now, and it's a bit too small.

They all say "hardened steel", so what's the real difference? I searched the forums and found lots of people complaining of stripped hubs, but I'd suspect that this often has as much to do with how good the cog is on and how good the lockring is on - not counting the person who had the EAI cog shatter on them.

Is it just a matter of nicer machined edges? This totally doesn't matter to me, this is not a bling bike, nor do I have a fancy chainring, nice and not exactly round. I know people will say that beware, you'll strip your hub, but can anyone give me any qualitative info on no name steel cogs? They don't look stamped like cheapo chainrings, and they're way cheaper, cheaper than two for one EAI or Surly it seems.

1. better machining (well, machining instead of stamping) which means more consistent widths and better teeth
2. better steel
3. better, more even threads means better thread engagement which means less strippage.
4. better "roundness" (sen Ken Cox's thread)

i have had cheapo cogs go out of shape, whereas the nicer cogs hold their shape.

here's my vote for the better threading. if you're got a cheaper hub, it will be more susceptible to stripped threads anyway, and it's only 20 for a good dura-ace cog or something.

take a handful of cheapy cogs and a handful of DA, EAI or other nice cogs. thread them each onto a hub body of your choice and see which ones go on effortlessly and which feel like they need a little more muscle to get on.

there have been so many threads about hubs, from suzue to phil, stripped by cheap cogs.

Can anyone tell me any real differences between no name cogs (like those sold by e.g. Ben's Bike) and name cogs?

That's easy.

A cheap cog will save you $10.

A cheap cog will ruin your hub.

A new hub and a wheel rebuild will cost you more than $10.

Dura Ace and EAI.

Matthew

Well, I guess I'm going to take it from your experience and skip the nonamers, even though with all that dough I'd'a saved I could bought... a used cd? Or a case of canned beer in New Jersey.

I converted a traditional 27" freewheel hub wheel to a fixie and and used a cheap cog. I wanted to use JB weld and a bottom bracket lockring to hold it on but

the cheap cog's threads went only halfway from inner to outer edge of the cog. So I had to put a 1.5mm spacer between it and the hub to make sure that enough of the cog's threads were touching the hub's threads. Without the spacer I believe that I would have stripped the hub threads. Needless to say, if I'd bought a Surly cog which is fully threaded from edge to edge, then I would've been able to leave the spacer out and had room to use JBWeld AND a bottom bracket lockring both. Oh well...

The verdict...since it's never coming off anyway, cheap did the job fine. It ain't broke yet and it rides 15 mi roundtrip to work on weekdays for 6 weeks now.

say no to no-name cogs

Friends dont let friends ride with cheap cogs. Anyways you can get a DA cog for like 20 bucks.

my vote is with DA and EAI, the extra money is worth it because as was pointed out a cheaper cog might cost you a lot more in the end