That's worth reconsidering, then. If I ordered one now, there wouldn't be that much time between getting the wheel, and the time it will take me to select the rest of the gear.

As for links on the MAC hub, I have a couple but I'm open to as many as get posted.
The more links, the better chance of something being a bit closer to me as far as shipping goes.

This concerns me. I really have no clue about this stuff, so I really don't know what to even ask about when I contact the vendor.

Shimano is good (and cheap) DNS is of questionable quality.

The problem with Shimano is that the smallest tooth is typically 14t (although I have found 13t). The Ebike crowd doesn't like to pedal, so they often get a DNS freewheel with an 11t.

Two problems there:
- DNS has had poor quality (although I have read they have been trying to improve that
- 11t is way too small for wear and tear on constant riding.

Best bet: Get the shimano, and if you don't like the gearing, get a bigger chain ring, rather than a smaller freewheel.

I don't want to push you away from buying US, but in Asia, EM3 and Ping battery both have very good reputations. Anything else from Asia, you are pretty much on your own. For instance, BMS battery is pretty popular because of their price and selection, but they have a very poor reputation on customer service. It is hard getting them to answer questions before the sale, and impossible after.

That website that compared MAC and BMC had some links to North American vendors.

Ok, I'm pretty much sold on the EM3 site.

But I wonder how many various sizes he carries of wheels.
I would like to stay with the exact same size range I already have.
Seems that maybe I might be better off doing the freewheel and rim here.

I have a cross tour mountain bike, that has DXT 116 rims(622mm).
It originally had 36-ish size tires, and I put Continental 32's on it, which work perfectly for me.

I'd need to match all of that to keep the bike running the way I like it.

A decent Shimano is "Okay" cheap and plentiful and last long enough not to be a total PITA to be changing them out all the time. Personally I have had the best luck buying high end retro freewheels "new in box" that are a couple decades old and sold as vintage collectors items. You can get down to a 12t on the bottom cog with them. Watch your threads not all of the old ones use the standard thread size we are used to. There is also one brand that was like the best of the best of the old ones with swap-able cogs for custom arrangements and is rebuild-able and were the ones that were made the longest before they finally quite making them after the modern cassette hubs became well established. Can't remember that name brand off the top of my head but I've got a box full of them along with cog sets for them along with spare parts and rebuild kits for them that I have snatched up over the years. Might have to wander out to the shop and look in that box and re-jog my memory, crazy I should have that brand name at the top of my memory but just isn't coming to me right now for some reason.

oh yeah, what about the spokes on these things, it requires thicker ones right?

can most rims accommodate the thicker size?


oh, and [MENTION=250962]turbo1889[/MENTION], i'll go with Shimano for sure.

Went out to the shop and checked the name brand ~ SunTour, those are the really good high end rebuild-able vintage freewheels. They should NOT be confused with a different present day name brand of SunRace, which are Walmart trash. Also the thread style on vintage freewheels that you want to avoid is "French" threads which have a different pitch to them. ISO threads is what is currently used today and all other threads except for the old french threads will work with the only difference being very slight in the diameter tolerances, where as the french threads have a different pitch and will cross-thread and mess up the threads.

Best current full production line common freewheels are the Shimano, some of the high end older vintage freewheels from the 80's and into the 90's for some brands that survived that long continuing to make freewheels, such as SunTour, but it was not the only one. I have a premium Olympic quality Titanium (as in made out of) corn-cob freewheel I managed to pick-up for a steal of a deal that is on one of my bikes that is made by some brand I never heard of until I bought it and have only seen two others by that brand for sale on the net since but so far I have not had to to replace it and it has been going strong with out the slightest sign of any trouble for years now and the cogs don't even show any wear or the bearings show any sign of loosness at all after several chain replacements and and a chain-wheel replacement on that drive-train.

Long story short, if you really really want a quality screw on freewheel it is possible but you will have to keep your eyes open and have your wallet ready.

I build it up like a tandem – thick spokes and lots of them.

36 spokes works fine. The generic wheel I got from China had real beefy spokes, and I had to order a spoke wrench to fit it (the bike shops stock the 3 basic sizes, but not extra large). EM3 has two basic 700c sizes – 19mm wide and 24mm wide.

A lot of these e-bike guys weigh well over 200lbs, ride 100lb bicycles and ride 2.5” tires. Not quite as heavy as a tandem, but they get ridden hard.

If you want 32mm tires, any wheel will be fine. Certainly with a big tire (over 50mm) you want a wide rim, but a standard 19mm rim will be fine. A lot of people like having big tires (40, 50, 60+mm) on ebikes as there isn’t much downside and give extra cushion at speed on non ideal roads.

Given that you are going to spend over $50 extra on shipping a wheel from Asia, building one at home is a good idea. That way you can get just what you want. At least EM3 uses Alex rims and not some cheap no name poorly built thing.

edit* had a few questions about rim stuff, but I decided to get just the hub, and have the rim built here at a local bike shop.

So now that I figured out what was going on with EM3's ordering, I have a 500 watt MAC motor with full upgrades heading my way via air mail.

Not bad for $400.
The savings will cover getting the wheel done here and then some.
Now I just have to get a battery and controller, and i'll be set.

good start! Now you'll just have to figure out what to do about those expensive batteries.

i'm not too worried about the battery cost. I mean it is what it is, I knew it would be expensive.
I'm going to try and do something in the range of 48v or more, and at least 13-ish amp hours.
I might even go upwards of 20, but it depends on if I can get a reasonable deal at that voltage.

I'm more concerned with the controller. this hub has all the bells and whistles, and I don't even have a clue about where to start on this.
I was looking around a little bit last night, and realized it might be more work than picking a hub was.

Hopefully you have figured this out, but the motor speed (or number of turns) doesn't really affect the torque very much (even though slower motors are sometimes called high torque motors, they are NOT higher torque). The number of turns affects the motor speed and efficiency. On the top end it determines the maxuimum speed, and on the low end how slow you can go without overheating the motor at full throttle (think accelerating from a stop or hill climbing).

yes, I did take that into consideration. I think I had the numbers in the last post that I edited. but I decided on the MAC 10T motor from EM3, which depending on the battery I get should be good for almost 25mph.
I ride with a digital odometer, and I have a fairly good idea of just how fast 25mph is, so that's plenty of speed for me.
and even though this is mostly for use on the local parkway bike path, I don't want to be capable of going so fast as to get the attention of the local constabulary. the last thing I need is to get my bike confiscated for being too powerful and join the ranks of Lance Armstrong on the performance enhancment list.