Hubs – Pro 4 vs DT 350 vs Superstar V6 vs ?

Before I continue, I’d just like to qualify that as a bike shop owner and mechanic, I’ve worked on (and owned just about everything mentioned) all the hubs mentioned, they all have their positives and negatives, what appeals to you will be determined by your own individual criteria. Anyway… Here’s some pro’s and con’s to the Hopes and DT 350’s…

Hope… Pro’s…

-Incredibly versatile (adapters to adapt most hubs to fit most standards)

-Fairly well priced

-Easy to self service with relatively few tools (it helps if you have proper bearing presses, but with care you can get away without)

-Reasonably fast pickup with 44T engagement (Pro4’s)

-Spares are readily available from most bike shops

-Cast iron backup from arguably the most grass roots of UK companies in the industry

-A range of colours (if that’s your thing)

Con’s…

-Alloy freehubs made of cheese!

-Pawl springs made out of similarly soft cheese as the freehubs!

-Bearing life typically not as good as some other cartridge bearing hubs

-Not quite the step up in performance/reliability that their price would suggest when compared to other, cheaper hubs.

-Some anodised colours fade rather faster than I’d deem acceptable

DT350… Pro’s…

-The most reliable freehub mecahnism… PERIOD (as the americans would say!)

-Priced on a par with Hope Pro 4’s, so again, fairly well priced.

-All the performance of the DT240’s for a little over half the price!

-Can be upgraded with 36T or 54T ratchet rings if faster engagement is required.

-Fairly versatile/adaptable compared to many.

-Better bearing life than other cartridge bearing hubs in my experience.

Con’s

-Despite being distributed by Madison (who also distribute Shimano), spares are a lot harder to come by and can often go out of stock, when compared to Hope in particular.

-When the centre hub bearing finally dies (it will last a very long time mind!) you need expensive proprietary tools to remove the ratchet drive ring to access it.

-Only available in Black

-Standard 18T ratchet rings give rather lazy engagement.

-The upgraded 54T and 36T ratchet rings don’t last as long as the 18T. In fact, for off road use, I wouldn’t recommend the 54T at all. The 36T give a good trade off of performance and reliability, but use the 18T if you want ultra reliability.

No point in mentioning the others really… The new Superstars don’t exist… The old ones are typically incredibly unreliable and difficult to get spares for. Shimano are chalk and cheese, cos their QR hubs are stupidly reliable as long as you keep up with the servicing, where their through axle hubs have ridiculously tiny bearings and fragile freehubs that tend to shatter into a million pieces in no time! Chris King’s are superb (but not without fault), but crazy money and need proprietary tools to service them, but looked after they’ll outlast the life of the bike that they’re attached to, and the next one, and the one after that! And then there’s DT 240’s… All the benefits of the 350’s and 20% lighter, for a mere 100% price increase! I guess you can’t have everything eh…

Anyway… If you’re buying with your head, it would always be DT 350’s… If you’re buying with your heart, it’s Chris King’s (if you can even remotely afford them!) or Hope Pro4’s if you can’t. Any of the cheaper options (unless you’re running QR front and rear, in which case there’s still a big argument for Shimano M756 XT’s) are false economy…

Hope that helps!

Hope- you know they give good support when it goes wrong because everyone on STW has a story about how their Hope thing broke and got fixed

DT- you have no idea if they give good support because you’ve never heard of it going wrong

Weirdly, this counts as a win for Hope.

Thanks for all the comments – coming down to DT vs Hope almost definitely.

I have the Shimano 756xt on my hardtail and not that impressed with the smoothness – I don’t want them on my nice bike – despite how cheap I can get them for! Even assuming I could get them in boost 148×12 / 15×100.

As I love a bargain I’ll just see which is the best priced hub at the time – the DT with the 36t ratchet or the Pro4.

@Mboy – without wishing to hijack the thread, if you had a set of approx 6 year old Kings in very good condition but built up as 26″, would you keep the hubs but get them built up as 650b, or sell the hubs and get new Pro4s built up in the same rims?

Good question Alex. Surely the answer is Kings built up as 650b. That wouldn’t even cost that much surely – £30 ish on spokes – £60 per rim plus your wheel builders cost. £250?

Been quoted approx £190 on E512s, £210 if the rear hub gets serviced, £250 if you include servicing of both hubs.

I’m in the DT Swiss camp though I have a several sets of wheels built on Hope hubs and the only issues I’ve had are with the Evo 2 freehub bearings – thread referenced on the previous page – and the tendency of some cassettes to dig into the alloy freehub body.

I also have a number of wheels on DT 240s – the posher version of the 350 with the same ratchet mechanism – and they’ve been pretty much flawless (touch wood). The only real issue I’ve had is with changing the inner bearing, which as mboy says, requires a special splined tool. It’s actually a really simple thing, but colossally overpriced unless you can go back in time 15 years or so and buy one for 20 quid, when it was still overpriced, but not by quite as much. Then again have you seen the price of Deloreans these days?

That said, the bearings behind that splined cover are really well protected and I’ve only had to use the tool twice despite a lot of miles in Peak District grinding paste.

Ultimately you’ll probably be fine with either. I do think the freehub mechanism and general sealing on the DT Swiss hubs is more reliable, but the Hopes generally are easy to work on and fix and Hope’s customer service is ace – or at least it will be as and when my replacement axle / freehub rock up and I can put my Sonder’s rear wheel back together and go ride…

Alex – that sounds like a good price for the rebuild. Can you service the hubs yourself to save money?

The e512 is quite strong but not that light – I’m pretty sure that’s what’s on my e1900 wheelset. Despite my best efforts they’re still totally true after 14 months or so of bashing them off stuff.

Those DT Swiss tools for the ratchet certainly are expensive – £40 or £50?!!

I’d intend to service the front as it’s easy; normally I do a basic strip down on the rear but to get the internal gibbons out you need to remove the bearings using a special tool which I don’t have, so it could do with a proper dig out. So approx £210 all in.

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Hope- you know they give good support when it goes wrong because everyone on STW has a story about how their Hope thing broke and got fixed

DT- you have no idea if they give good support because you’ve never heard of it going wrong

Weirdly, this counts as a win for Hope.

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To be fair on them, they make a lot more parts than DT, no ones had a DT brake piston seal fail because DT don’t make brakes. And a lot of stuff they do is non warranty stuff, like “I need a new pad retaining pin for C2 brake but no one stocks it” and they just sent it out FOC.

The only trully unreliable Hope part I can think of was the first Pro2 which cracked as they weren’t made from forged blanks, and hope seemed to repair every one including shipping and rebuilding wheels that weren’t theirs!

So it boils down to hope with 44t ratchets and the chance those ratchets might need £3 on some new pawl springs every so often. Or DT with an 18t ratchet, or DT with 36/52t ratchets and more questionable reliability and very expensive tools and spares to fix it.

Or Novatec/Bitex/Chosen, not without their problems but cheap enough to be considered disposable if you do have a problem.

I don’t know enough about Novatec / Bitex / Chosen really – but a lot of people seem to be quite skeptical about their longevity. I want to build these wheels and keep them for a fairly long time – without having to rebuild a new hub when I can’t get replacement parts if a freewheel goes etc.

I think my Superstar electro front hub is rebranded novatec and it seems well enough made from what I can make out though.

I don’t know what you are all doing to your Shimano hubs

Rode them, in the mud, in winter. It wasn’t that the main bearings died (well, the rear did eventually), it’s that I had to keep cracking it open to be sure. Left it too long one winter and the internals were starting to look pretty grubby so I don’t have enough confidence in the sealing to leave them for a few months, given the potential for writing off a hub. Cartridge bearings just get replaced when they start to feel rough/loose. It’s the choice between reactive and preventative maintenance I suppose- these days I’d rather just replace when needed.

Those DT Swiss tools for the ratchet certainly are expensive – £40 or £50?!!

People have been known to make their own using half a DT ratchet welded to an appropriate piece of metal, but if you look on eBay, someone seems to be selling them for 18 quid – from China. Er, this 

Good find, I’ll save that to my eBay in case I go DT Swiss….

Get the Hubdoctor DT tool, it’s cheaper and way better than the real thing. The direct copies are fine too

https://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-PRODUCT-HUBDOCTOR-DT-SWISS-RING-TOOL-NEW-PRODUCT-DISCOUNT-/232618276038

Incidentally, some people mentioned reliability of the 36T adaptor, I think that’s only from early ones which wore quickly. I’ve had a 36T set in for… Ohh, 4 or 5 bikes, anyway, at least since 2010, and they’ve never missed a beat.

The tool for DTs is only needed when accessing the DS axle support bearing. You don’t need it to service the ratchet mechanism itself.

It’s no rarely needed it’s a non-issue for me.

Just a change of subject – butnhas anyone got the new Hunt mtb wheels? The trail wide are 30mm internal diameter, have triple butted spokes, a 4 degree engagement hub, are under £350 and weigh 1750 ish grams for the pair in 27.5” wheels.

Sounds too good to be true? Not sure if rebranded novatech hubs or something else….

Hunt hubs are rebranded newest novatechs

which isnt necessarily a bad thing

I’ve never found Novatec/Superstar rebranded at all difficult to get spares for …. they are available but the free hub is expensive for the cost of the hubs… I found the hub discounted and got “free” end caps axle etc. for not much more than the £40 for the free hub… but in the end still have it as replacing the 6902 bearings fixed it.

However in general I’d work on not needing to change a hub – just service it… as it’s then new spoke time as well…so simplest and easiest to service.  My DT 350 (Giant) is currently with LBS…. as I didn’t want to mess about myself messing with the bearings…

Bitex rebrand… I have 2x rear fuel hubs… the QR ones leaks and the end caps fall out… the 12mm is really good…after seeing the mess inside the QR (on Jnr’s wheel) I stripped mine and it was perfect inside… ???  It’s also very limited as what end caps you can get …

If weight is a concern, don’t forget that the centrelock DT350’s are noticeably lighter than the 6bolt IS models.  Yes, it limits you to centrelock rotors but as most go for Shimano anyway is that really such a problem?

I’m on Sram centreline rotors at the moment with Guide brakes. No plans to change brakes at all – and if I did it wouldn’t be to Shimano. If I changed I think it would be to Magura mt5’s or something like that.

I guess I could use Shimano rotors with the Guides if there was a significant weight saving though. I wouldn’t have realised the centrelock hubs were lighter if you hadn’t mentioned it though.

It’s quite a noticeable weight saving in the grand scheme of things wheelwise. If you look at the size of the lump of metal added for an IS 6bolt mount it’s not hard to see where it comes from either.

Shimano rotors will work well with Magura or SRAM brakes.  I think it’s only one or two of the Hope brakes that still really need the OE rotor due to brake track size/shape.

In theory, it’s a concern that you need a B.B. tool handy to remove the rotor, but in practice I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen anything productive achieved by being able to remove your rotor trail side with a multi tool.

49grams difference between CL and 6 bolt hubs? I assume rotor and fixings would save slightly more, buts its all in the middle of the wheel.

I guess it’s not a huge weight saving – Guess the rim and spike weights probably make more difference to the feel of wheels?

I don’t think I’ve ever removed a rotor whilst out on a trail so I don’t think there’s an issue with centrelock per day.

The guides on my hardtail work ok with a cheap Shimano (6 bolt) rotor too.

I’d probably prefer to stay 6 bolt so I can reuse my existing rotors though.

@Mboy – without wishing to hijack the thread, if you had a set of approx 6 year old Kings in very good condition but built up as 26″, would you keep the hubs but get them built up as 650b, or sell the hubs and get new Pro4s built up in the same rims?

Assuming you are using the same axle standards, but on a new bike with 650b wheels… Then DEFINITELY get your King’s rebuilt into new rims and serviced etc. The big issue comes in for me when it comes to the BOOST problem, whereby you end up with a very expensive pair of hubs that won’t fit any bikes you want to own any more!

It’s quite a noticeable weight saving in the grand scheme of things wheelwise. If you look at the size of the lump of metal added for an IS 6bolt mount it’s not hard to see where it comes from either.

Centrelock rotors are usually heavier than 6 bolt rotors though… At least when you take the lockring into account too. There’s a small weight saving with centrelock over 6 bolt, but it’s not anything you’d actually notice unless your sole aim was to build the lightest bike you possibly could!

I don’t know enough about Novatec / Bitex / Chosen really – but a lot of people seem to be quite skeptical about their longevity.

They’re mostly OK if you budget them as throwaways over a period of time say. They’re all fully serviceable (if you can find the parts as mostly no UK distribution of said parts, and the vastness of different model numbers will make you wince!) but they’re not made to last in the same way a Hope/DT Swiss/King is with regular maintenance… The thing is though, with the way the industry is forcing new “standards” on us with such glee, there’s less point in buying nice hubs than there used to be, certainly if you’re not sure how long you’re going to keep the bike that they’re going on!

It’s finding the parts to service Novatec hubs that worries me. There seem to be so many variants on things and it’s difficult to find what you’ve got / need and where to get things from. I’m ok with it on my cheapie bike where I got a bargain on rims for £12 each etc and built myself – but not on my nice bike.

I guess the bonus with Hope is they seem to support their products on an ongoing basis – so chances are it’ll fit whatever comes next with some retrofit parts. I’ve got no intention of selling this bike anytime soon either. It’s about as up-to-date as possible with boost / metric shock / enduro geometry etc.

I guess the bonus with Hope is they seem to support their products on an ongoing basis

Kinda, they carry spares for a good long while (and I’ve know people break 90’s mono-ti hubs and get a pro2 replacement out of good will.  But just like everyone else their old stuff is obsolete. Can’t get an 11s road cassette on a 10s pro2 unless it’s the later 44t version for example. And Boost support was patchy.

If it was 1990 you could have bought a set of chris king hubs and probably still used them up until 2006 ish when the Rockshox Pike was the only fork to have and made 20mm the default for everything other than XC. 16 years from one set of hubs! In the next 12 years or so you would have bought a 100×15 front, then a 135 bolt through, then 142 bolt through, then 147, and that’s assuming you didn’t take a diversion via fat bikes (170/177/190/197), or want to use them on your new road bike with disk brakes (no idea, everyone seemed to make their own hub/frame standard at some point)..

It’s all about pivot’s superboost now surely? 😜

Assuming you are using the same axle standards, but on a new bike with 650b wheels… Then DEFINITELY get your King’s rebuilt into new rims and serviced etc. The big issue comes in for me when it comes to the BOOST problem, whereby you end up with a very expensive pair of hubs that won’t fit any bikes you want to own any more!

Thanks Mboy. The guy I approached to the build (Ryanbuildswheels) recommended the same. Yep, the wheels are currently in 26″ form on a Bird Aeris 1.5 so non boost. I won’t be replacing the frame anytime soon but when I do, hopefully someone will still want Kings in old standard. Mind, I got them nearly new from a mate for £250 so I’m hardly going to lose a load of cash!