Good Budget Touring Hubs?
 

I just built my first wheel from an old Phil touring hub and a DT TK540 rim (front wheel). I'm currently building up a Bianchi as a touring bike and want to build a rear wheel but I'm not ready to shell out $450 for a matching Phil rear hub.

Suggestions for a good touring hub on a budget?

Deore
XT

Seems to me from memory that Americans can find them online for 40,50 ish bucks

My take is that xt tends to have slightly better materials and or seals. I have both on bikes and older xt stuff, if greased and adjusted properly, last a good long time, with grease staying clean quite well.

130mm- 105 or Ultegra.
135mm- Deore or Deore XT.

All are well made, sealed well, and easy to service. The Ultegra is really easy, actually.

I have several rear wheels built with Shimano Deore LX as well as Tiagra hubs that have lasted for years. At least once on each wheel, I have repacked the bearings and never noticed any pitting in the cups. They run as smoothly as when they were new.

You did not say if it is 130mm or 135mm. Or disc vs non-disc.

I built up a new touring bike last spring, I used a new XT M756A hub. Steel axle. Cheap. It is a 135mm hub for disc brakes. Before I ordered it I asked a bike mechanic what he thought of for a touring bike hub, the older ball bearing hubs or the newer cartridge style hubs. He said that the old ones that use 1/4 inch steel balls are the best.

That made me pretty happy to hear since I had the same types of hubs on two other touring bikes. Those had been trouble free for years, but it never hurts to ask if there is something better.

I bought this one for my new build last spring, but I was buying other stuff from Europe, so if you are in USA and are only buying a hub you probably can get a better shipping price from another source.
https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/hubs-cas...tte-hub-black/

Note that there are aluminum axle XT hubs and steel axle XT hubs. For touring on a rear wheel I will only use the steel axle ones.

I used an old Phil Wood Freewheel hub for 10 years and on several multi month tours..

Meh. If you've got a Phil on the front, why not get the maintenance free benefit of something similar on the rear?

If you can't afford a Phil Wood for the rear, shanabrook.jody, you can go with White Industries which is about $100 cheaper than a Phil but not as easy to work on. I my experience and opinion, the Whites are smoother and much lighter but they aren't as simple to remove and replace bearings. On the upside, I haven't had to replace bearings in a Phil or White with over 20,000 miles of use for the former and 10,000 miles for the latter.

You can also go with a Velo Orange Grand Cru which is about $300 cheaper than the Phil. Not US made but it seems simpler even than the Phils to disassemble.

Finally, however, the economy of the Phils is better than you think. I have Phils that are more than 10 years old, have 20,000 issue (and maintenance) free miles on them and I suspect that they can go another 20 to 40 years before I'd have to replace them. Even at only 10 years old, they have cost me $40 per year which is pretty cheap. At 50 years old, they will have cost me $10 per year.

Assuming you want rim-braked, silver finish, Shimano cassette compatible, 130mm OLD QR axle type, I suggest VO touring hub. A few here have tried them with apparently no negative feedback.

Most have had good results with Deore/LX/SLX/XT level Shimano Mtb rear hubs. These are fairly inexpensive, but nowadays most come only in disc version (which IS still compatible with rim brakes), black finish, 135mm OLD QR (older Mtb spacing) and 32h. Tourers normally opt for 36h, and 135mm spacing builds better wheels than 130mm OLD (normal road bike spacing), which is fine for most as they also desire lower gearing available with Mtb components.

If you built a front wheel with DT TK540 for a Bianchi then you probably need 700c wheeled / 130mm OLD rear spacing, and to match an old PW front hub (almost certainly rim brake compatible in polished Al finish) you'd want a silver hub, available at <PW pricing, which narrows choice considerably. The VO hub has replaceable cartridge bearings which are potentially longer-lived than the less costly Shimano hubs with loose balls in cup and cone. Under normal usage the Shimano hub's cup eventually becomes eroded with a track worn in by the balls, and since the cup is pressed in, it's not user replaceable, so the hub must be replaced, meaning a wheel rebuild required. By this point the rim typically has a lot of brake track wear and needs to be replaced as well, so the inexpensive-but-disposable Shimano hub approach is actually fairly practical.

https://velo-orange.com/collections/...-4-bearing-hub

Any of the current Shimano hubs should be fine...

NB> Out here, in the busy (hundreds) touring season , you get those when you damage your wheel.. & they wont be upper tier ..

Not a lot of shop time to devote to a custom rebuild, and people won't hang out for days until that kind of work can be fit in a very busy short summer ..

so fancy stuff can be a handicap ... Expensive hubs have been cut out of damaged wheels and mailed home..


so you may want to be realistic... in what you choose ..








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+1 on the White Industries stuff. I am quite happy with all the products I have from them including hubs and freewheels.

Thank you to everyone for the advice!
As for my lack of specificity, I am looking for a 135 QR rim brake hub.

the guy asks 'budget', you say Phil. On another thread, the guy asks 'budget' drivetrain upgrade, you say Rohloff.

The VOs come in 135 too.

Rear Deore- 36H- $26.95
https://www.amazon.com/Shimano-Deore.../dp/B00UB60P3U

Rear Deore LX- 32H- $47.87
https://www.amazon.com/Shimano-DEORE.../dp/B00963BA0G

Rear XT- 36H- $60.19
https://www.amazon.com/Shimano-XT-T7...4JM6PSM3XXTWYB

These are all 135 spacing and would all be great "budget" hubs. I would be tempted to go with the Deore at that price. Folks here could detail the differences among these three but for touring application probably nothing worth the price differential.

Mine was budget, bought the hubshell* at a bike shop rummage sale , sent it in to PW Co and they pressed in a rear bearing/axle assembly..

the freewheel type 6 speed 126 .. * I suspect it may have been from a tandem front..
BITD Phil has their own disc brake , it screwed on the hub, left end..
A nickel steel tube with aluminum spoke flanges, back then..

rear would have been threaded on both ends..


Yea now just get Shimano Freehubs ,, trash the rim, you abandon it,
and get a wheel in stock at the bike shop and be back on the road again that day.




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In post number 5 above, I suggested a steel axle XT hub if you were getting disc brake and 135 mm spacing.

Since you are getting a rim brake 135mm hub, I do not know if you can find a steel axle XT hub for rim brakes any more. (I have two on older trouble free 36H wheels with steel axle XT rim brake hubs, but they might be out of production now.) If you can't find one, I would suggest the Deore level hub as that I think still uses steel axles.

Or, if you might later buy a frame that takes disc brakes, you could buy a disc brake hub at this time and be able to use the wheel as a rim brake wheel now, and later as a disc brake wheel. But since we are in an early stage of a shift to through-axle hubs, it is impossible to say what the standard will be in a decade.

Does not even need be XT level ..

cassette drivers all about the same internally, cup & cone on the hub left end just less polished.,,

seeing rubber external boot seals on some pretty cheap, but adequate, hubs..


I would take a new hub apart enough to add more grease than the factory (economics) used ..






....

Keep in mind budget is not just right then and there but also cost over time. A Phil Wood hub is likely to outlast many wheelsets and can be quite easily serviced. Rohloff hubs also last a really long time with low service intervals. Yes they do cost more initially but having something that could last longer than you and will retain value over time can be considered budget. Just because something is cheap doesn't make it budget.

Suggesting that you have a freewheel hub that has lasted over 10 years and many long tours and is still going sounds pretty budget to me. I know some folks who go through wheels more frequently and something like that would be a wise move for them.

However yes there are hubs that exist which do the job quite decently and don't cost as much.

@OP I would recommend getting a disc hub regardless because that way you can still keep using it if you make the switch to discs and keep QRs. You just won't use the rotor mount. It will be a lot easier to find disc 135 then non-disc

I have it firmly in mind. It's just that most peoole don't go through 'many wheelsets'. I have no doubt about Phil's durability. It's just that it is surplus, excess durability for those at the extreme margins. Ditto for Rohloff. But let's cut through the fog here. The likes of Phil and Rohloff are often status symbols. If i had a penny for everytime you guys lecture, hector us on the advantages of Phil, Rohloff, etc. Bob has a penchant for bringing up his Rohloff and Phil at every turn. Tone-deafness, that's what it is when the constraint is 'budget', and one suggests Rohloff and Phil.

...As spoken from someone who can easily throw down $400 on hubs and it’s not a big deal? By your logic, given that for the most part in the bicycle world the most expensive parts are generally better, the most budget friendly bike one could buy would be the $10,000 one. It’ll last the rest of their lifetime(and likely their kids when they pass it on) and they’ll never have to buy another bike part. It will also retain much better resale value than the cheaper bike.

You know what someone means when they ask for advice on a good budget item.

Hey Stuart, are you sure you are and chemist and not an accountant? :foo:










:innocent:

I have a set of the VO grand cru hubs that I bought last year. I like them a lot and expect they will last pretty much forever. You can service the hubs and even pull the cassette with no special tools which is nice. I also have a bunch of shimano cup and cone hubs that are a lot cheaper, and I expect will last forever too. They're just a little harder to service.

Some people run stuff into the ground, I work in a shop and see it quite a lot. People abuse their wheels more often than not and while you don't have to run Phil Wood having something durable and well built is helpful. As far as Rohloff if you pair that with a belt drive that is something you don't need to touch, meaning no maintenance and the way a lot of folks abuse their drivetrain having something like that can be quite useful for people. Yes they can be partially considered status symbols but also a symbol of high quality and craftsmanship. People on this forum have a penchant for complaining when something isn't $5 down at the Wally-Mart or at the Jeff Bezos Online Bike Shop.

Not easily for sure but I would so I am not spending that money and more down the line. I scrimp and save, I am not a millionaire, I work in a shop. I value made in America stuff of high quality and stuff I don't really have to adjust and mess with much.

I am wondering where you got 10k from? I wouldn't suggest someone buy a touring bike for 10k unless it was a full custom Di2 set up. You can get a fine touring bike for much much cheaper. My all out ****** build touring bike would probably be 5k if I totaled it up and I am not saying it was affordable because to me it was a lot of saving and buying parts slowly over time and taking over a year to get it built up.

Buying a Surly Trucker would be a fine touring bike and one that would serve someone quite well. There are other bikes on the market as well and you could easily buy something and upgrade as needed. The most expensive stuff isn't always the best but in a good number of cases it tends to be. The cost isn't just for status and if it is, it isn't worth it but if it is a good durable part with low maintenance is worth the cost in some cases. I did say earlier in my last post and have repeated it throughout that you can find cheaper stuff that is still of good quality but as usual nobody cares to listen, they just want to hate stuff that they might consider expensive for whatever reason.

You still have to cost/benefit analysis if you are a chemist;)

I agree with the posters who've had good things to say about the VO touring hub. It's dead simple to take off the freehub if you pop a spoke. No need for a hypercracker. Also easy to lube and clean the pawls if they get contaminated.

I personally wouldn't use Shimano hubs but I get the appeal. They do last a long time and they're cheap, but once the freehub fails it's a toss up whether a bike shop will have the right one in stock. The axles do break too. And servicing them requires cone wrenches, which I wouldn't want to lug around on a tour.

My wife's rear Shimano hub started making scary noises in the middle of our 5-month Euro tour. We stopped by a couple of bike shops in Geneva. No one would service the hub. Instead we bought a new wheel. I was miffed but the wheel was cheap (another Shimano hub) and it lasted the rest of the trip.