Shimano XT hubs or DT Swiss 350 hubs? Road cycling.

To have a pair of road wheels made with centre lock hubs I have basically 2 choices. Shimano XT or 350’s. Its £70 more for Dt swiss but on a road bike I think the shimano look more slick and stylish. The DT’s I think are more towards the MTB world of cycling. At the same time I don’t mind paying extra £70 if they roll better and last longer.

I’d choose DT. They are a lot more long lasting (and I like cup and cone!) and lighter too.

High end Shimano road cup and cone really are lovely to ride, a bit nicer than the 240 I think. And the new tool free adjust thing is faff free (do XT have that?) That’s just my experience of their road hubs though, don’t know if that carries over to XT.

Still like the 240’s though. And if it was for an all year round set of training or commuting wheels I’d probably go for the DT hubs.

Edit.. seen the Shimano CX75 Ultegra level disc hubs?

Mrblobby they are the ones I’m debating on! Shimano CX75. I like them because they don’t have ultegra graphics on them. I don’t want a bike with different logos all over it. Plus they look slick and and proper looking road hub and not moutain bike hub.

If you know how to use a cone spanner I’d go for Shimano. Done some stonking mileage on XT, just give it a twiddle every now and then and don’t let it deteriorate.

Don’t even need a cone spanner. All tool free adjustment these days.

Jebus, I need some new kit.

Don’t even need a cone spanner. All tool free adjustment these days.

How’s that work, sounds like magic?

How’s that work, sounds like magic?

not quite tool free I think, doesn’t it use hex keys in the ends of the axles and some sort of indexing thing on the cones?

You need hex keys if you want to take it apart, but just a tweak of a dial for the bearings (I think, I’ve not done it in a while, which probably means I should go check them!)

Dt it is! Thanks.

Sounds great. Faffing around with cone spanners taking several goes to get it just right was always a bit of a pain

How’s that work, sounds like magic?

New ones from about 1:20 onwards…

Unfortunately the tool free adjust (or ‘Digital Click’ tm) seems restricted to the factory wheelsets or Dura Ace hubs, they haven’t seen fit to trickle it down to the CX75s or XTs.

I’ve searched everywhere but the most definitive answer I got was from Evans Q&A section who confirmed cone spanners required 🙁

You’d think Shimano would be pushing the tool free adjust though, I like cup and cone but was forever fiddling to get the perfect adjustment, with the tool free on my RS81s it’s almost as easy as checking your tyre pressure 8)

oh and re: DT I think I was put of the 240s as the flange spacing builds a less stiff wheel than equivalent shimanos? I know my RS81s were a revelation in side-to-side stiffness, no more brake rub under cornering or sprinting 😀

Are the new Shimano freehubs better than the older ones? Seen so many of those give up and as they are ‘not user servicable’ items it gets annoying.

Definitely digital clicky adjustment on the ultegra hubs i got last year.

Interesting, are they disc or non-disc?

Non disc. I’d just check the Shimano tech doc site for the CX75 ones.

That’s the CX-75 axle arrangement from SJS Cycles…

and this is the Dura Ace.

If it weren’t for the £79.99 price tag it would be interesting to see if you could use the Dura Ace assembly in the CX75. Wonder if the centrelock arrangement gets in the way of the digital click arrangement…

Yes, shame, same in the tech docs. Imagine it will trickle down to the non series parts.

That Shimano click adjustment looks brilliant.

I wonder if it can be retro fitted.

6800 hubs are definitely click adjustment, but they don’t look the same as the DA ones, it uses a springy washer/pawl rather than the toothed nut on DA. And they’re only £27 from SJS. I imagine it’ll fit 5800 front hubs, not so sure about the older hubs with more solid axles. But then the hub shells look like the same old shells they’ve always used.

Disappointing my 5800 hubs didn’t get it, some sites said they did, but I think it’s just alen key + 1 cone spanner adjustable rather than click adjustments. Odd they didn’t trickle it down, I imagine it’s much less fiddly in the factory which is where they’d really be bothered about it.

Tip for C&C adjustments, just get it about right, then tweek it in/out just moving the cone/nut that tightens in that direction (i.e. no need to loose the other first), the other will give just enough and you can get the tension perfect first time.

Those CX-75 axles don’t look to have cone flats, and have a hex key fitting in the end rather than a locknut.

Just to throw another option in, what about Shimano RS505’s, 105 level centerlock hubs, come in 32 & 36 hole options, and come in black

Ransos, if you look at the component at the top right of the CX-75 assembly you can see a very faint ‘corner’ at the bottom, at about 6 o’clock, which looks extremely like the edge of a spanner flat to me… There’s also no index ‘ring’ like the little toothed ring in the Dura Ace pic.

I didn’t realise what a geek I had become about Shimano bearing assemblies 😳

Ransos, if you look at the component at the top right of the CX-75 assembly you can see a very faint ‘corner’ at the bottom, at about 6 o’clock, which looks extremely like the edge of a spanner flat to me…

Oooh, I think you’re right.

If you are planning on using 11 speed road cassettes those hubs won’t be suitable- you can get a 11 speed free hub for the DT swiss hub, but it would require a re-dish of the wheel

^ only by .5 of a mm… redishing not necessary.

i know the spacing changes fractionally (1mm) when using 135 QR end caps but is it the same when using 142×12 end caps?

Is the road free hub for 11 speed not something like 2 or 1.8mm wider? Of course if you aren’t using 11 speed road cassettes it’s not an issue.