Long post, so TL:DR – someone machined me a replacement stainless steel Hope Pro 4 Fatsno axle, and it is teh awsumz.

Genuinely fabulous. @stwhannah said this is her favourite location, and it has come up trumps again. My little tale is not on the same scale as the Gnusmasmobile, or building a trike for disabled kids, or the epic public service input on the covid thread (Tired was great on the podcast BTW, if you’ve not listened yet), but it is nonetheless one of joy and happiness.

The samaritan in question this time is @mick_r

As per this threads, I was trashing hope pro 4 fatsno rear hubs at an alarming rate. It wasn’t (just) the fact that they needed replacing/fixing all the time, it was the fact that I could no longer trust the bike. That really curtails and constrains riding fun. Full fat or 29+ wheels were affected equally. Imagine heading out with your son for a well earned big ride, or taking a group of cubs/scouts on an adventure (with yours truly laden with emergency snacks, first aid kits and clothing replacements!), only to find that BANG the hub has gone again.

Constant Hope Pro 4 freehub failures – anything to be done?

That led to concluding that my beloved custom Chi Ti frame, Nanny, may really be the culprit. However the same issue’s presenting themselves on my old Surly ICT suggested it was not just down to my design . Anyway, That led to the thread on replacing my frame with something more robust, but with a twist appearing as folks really started to hone in on the likely flex in a very wide (197mm), lightweight and QRd Pro 4 Fatsno hollow axle.

Custom frame for a big heavy guy – groupthink

Aforementioned Mick offered that he could indeed likely machine me something much more up to the task. So off we went! I sent off an axle and bolt thru-axle from one of the hubs, along with a bunch of photos of the dropouts, and he took to machining a solid, stainless steel, with ‘f-off’ large 8mm bolts, axle that would likely be more up the task.

After delays on my side due to covid, and a fall on the hill whilst walking the dog requiring, embarrassingly, an MR rescue for a dislocated knee and lots of ripped muscles etc, I finally got round to fitting it in a hub and getting Nanny built back up again and ready for action. This would be in the full fat wheels, as the 29+ rear hub had shat it’s ratchet ring and required the wheel stripped down and hub sent to Hope (with a long explanatory letter and after many phone calls – lets see if they develop an in house solution).

The new axle is a thing of absolute beauty. The old axle feels like it weights about 10g of heavily machined tinfoil, the new one feels like it’s made out of the core of a neutron star. Reassuringly hefty 😎. Bearings slide on ‘just so’, the the old endcaps fit on perfectly, and the whole thing mounts in the dropouts right on the nose. Once I wind in the HUGE 8mm bolts, I’m ready for nuclear war! Clamping force at the dropouts is certainly no longer something I need more of, and flex should be banished.

I’m about 250km in on the full fat wheels, and it seems, with increasing optimism, that Mick has created the antidote to my misery. Thus far, none of the tell tale warning signals are present. I’ve had the free hub off a couple of times to check things seem rosy, and it is looking good. I will put a new free hub body in soon, as the tell-tale ratchet teeth marks on the body of the old one told of flex, and I want to see if that is banished.

I have a very nice full sus too, but nothing as versatile as Nanny. Now I have a bike I can trust and love again, just getting out and riding. Grinding up awful steep crawls, putting the power down on slow nadgery tech climbs, smacking through a rock jumbled descent, cranking out of the saddle to nail that lovely bit of singletrack… and that brings me joy, happiness and thoughts of hub-failure related stress fade into the background.

We know that for many of us, riding is a huge part of our overall mental and physical health. This 197mm wide pice of unobtanium with it’s own gravitational field has come at a perfect time to ensure my wellbeing is tip top. Cheers @mick_r !!

Hope are currently sorting the other hub, keen to learn if they can offer anything.

Anyway, some pictorial evidence:
Me, huge, fat, and Nanny

Nanny looking absolutely awesome in early days before things started to go wrong

Another collection of broken pawls – these ones took the ratchet ring with them

My old axle and bolt thru on it’s way to Mick

The new axle installed – ‘quite’ a solid set up and a ‘quite’ secure bolt at either side 🙂

Nanny at the top of a big hill this morning, having not shat itself – Hurray!

Fantastic, great job Mick.

Can vouch for the fact that Mick is an extremely talented and thorough engineer/frame builder/mechanic.
He is also a bloody good bloke too, as you have found.

That’s brilliant! Nice work Mick!

Nice work. Reminds me of BMX in the 90s when a lot of products weren’t easily available and riding was becoming harder (especially street riding) and components weren’t up to it. So many people made small businesses (probably not making much money) providing parts which people needed – pegs/stems/axles/hubs etc.

Incredible work.

8mm hex key, M12 thread – brings new levels of heftyness to “bolt in” axle 🙂

I must point out that Mr Nanny also made a nice donation to the folks at http://www.motivation.org.uk

And Mr Sparkle will have to come and visit us at the new pad sometime. 19 mile cycle to work tomorrow morning so should be pretty fit by summer…..

Absolutely top peeps on here.

Nice work Mick!

That is splendid stuff to read about. Excellent work 😁

Great stuff!

My fatty is also the one which tends to be taken on my most far flung adventures, so I can imagine how frustrating it would be to lose trust in it.
Nice one Mick.

We heart STW. Great effort Mick.

And I was up there too today, but not until this afternoon – the main tourist path was hoaching like Sauchiehall St but luckily that’s not the way I descend.

Just found some pictures.

Aluminium with a 12mm hole down the middle and solid stainless with 20mm deep M12 holes each end. Wonder which bends more at the freehub shoulder under chain loading?….

Choose your weapon. We went supersize.

And Mr Sparkle will have to come and visit us at the new pad sometime. 19 mile cycle to work tomorrow morning so should be pretty fit by summer…..

May well take you up on that!
You’ll either be fit or knackered! ;0)

🦣 Calves. Surprised the chain don’t snap before the axle.😃
Lovely bit of engineering by mick, might start getting pestered to do custom bits for others now though.🙂

Choose your weapon. We went supersize.

Hilariously so! The whole thing feels completely epic 🙂

@greeny30 – I definitely replace chains frequently! and painful experience has told me that quick links are, for me, definitely not re-usable.

Now, I wonder what Hope will say about the other hub?

Thought I’d pop an update.

another couple of hundred kms done, and everything is still fine. I am confident now that things are indeed ‘solid’. Checked the free hub last night, no scoring from the ratchet ring on the free hub body, inner bearing perfect, and pawls all in perfect nick.

We are golden!

On the other hub that I returned to Hope, after many phone calls explaining all of the above and that I really didn’t expect them to warranty replace ANOTHER fatsno hub, and that could they please consider doing a solid steel axle… well, after they received my borked hub, I got no word at all from them except a couple fo days later when a brand new hub + spare free hub arrived.

So, as usual, amazing from Hope. However, kinda disappointed they haven’t dealt with the source, even though they have replaced everything with no qualms.

Anyway, mick kindly making me a another solid steel axle now – cheers mick!

(new hub has already been laced to the 29+ rims, but I will wait to use it until I can put a ‘proper’ axle into it).

That hub looks like it has a bunch of Hope headset spacers glued into the middle, no surprise it was flexy 🙂