Tandem Tom

My wife and I are currently cycling across Canada. This Spring I built up 2 new front wheels with SP Dynamo hubs. Well at about 1500 miles my wife's start making noise and it progressively got worse. I was adding chain lube to keep it quiet but there was side to side play starting to take place.
Contacted SP, in Tiawain, they sent a new hub and I had it forwarded to a General Delivery in International Falls Minnesota. So yesterday the local bike shop, The Sports Shop, allowed me the use of his truing stand. The old hub's bearings were SHOT. So after building up the new wheel my wife said today's ride , about 60 miles, felt like the bike was rolling with less resistance.
Had to mail the old hub,at my expense, back to Tiawain.

GamblerGORD53

Seriously ?? You are using another one ?? GIGO
My SA XL FDD has 22,000 miles. At 17,000 it ate 4 bearings in the elec side. Put in a new sealed bearing that will go years again. AND the brake still works fine.

tspoon

At a guess I would say if this were common we'd have heard this story many other times, suggesting it isn't. I would say the OP has just had bad luck, hope the replacement goes much better. For comparison my Shimano 675 hub went only around 7000k before I decided to check and noticed minor pitting on the cone. I greased it up with something quite thick and sticky, and did another 5000 touring, as the replacement never made it to me in time. It wasn't much worse when I finally replaced it.

Tourist in MSN

I get a little nervous about bearings that are not user servicable, but I did not let that stop me from buying an SP. bought my first SP in spring 2013. It has worked great and that includes some off road riding (Canyonlands in UT, Maah Daah Hey trail in ND) and rough touring (interior roads in Iceland).

Bought my second SP this year for another bike. I put 56 miles on it today, but not touring, just riding.

I also have a Shimano dynohub that I think has some user serviceable bearings (bought it used this past winter) but I chose the SP for two of my touring bikes due to the reported high efficiency and low rolling resistance.

I agree with tspoon, this is the first SP problem I have heard of. And I think it is a good sign that it could keep rolling after problems were evident. That is a huge positive instead of it catastrophically failing and leaving you stranded.

Aushiker

+ 1 I haven't heard of any common issues with the SP hubs and I ride with one along with a SON hub and previously a Shimano.

I am not concerned and I am pleased at least SP got a hub to the OP quickly.

rhm

Yeah. Thanks, @Tandem Tom, for letting us know; those of us who care about these things will keep an eye out for similar stories. But no cause for panic at this point.

davidg1982

Thanks for sharing. I'll have to keep this in mind as I am getting a new wheel build with an SP hub.