Originally Posted by radical_edward

Would you tour on a Shimano hub? Most would without reservation yet the pawls failing in the freehub body is not uncommon.

The Rohloff is a serious bit of metal. If you ever have the chance to see one opened up, do so. Magnificent. Catastrophic failure is not an option.

As mentioned earlier, the only weak point is the shifter and cables. Any serious tourist should have a cable or two in their kit. But worst case, I am sure that anybody with rudimentary metalworking skills and a metal file/leatherman (or cash) could manage to adapt a regular cable (or have it done for them). I have seen a picture of a replacement Rohloff twist grip fashioned out of wood even.

Yes, Rohloff is typical tetutonic overkill. But they have solved a plethora of weaknesses in a conventional drive chain. People need to stop imagining succesively worse case scenarios every time new technology comes up and judge a system by its merits.

Otherwise we would still be riding round on lugged steel bikes with cantilever brakes and waxed cotton panniers......