First Look: Hope Releases DH Version of PRO 5 Hub

 PB bough info about your salary from Facebook and offered Hope a deal so they pay only for clicks that matter, simple. Plus they don't have to pay for bandwidth.
*Hope Robin does not read comments and if you do Robin, it was my idea ...*

 There is a thumbnail on the front page so that'll have to do for now.

 Only vis to outside+

 "Marion, don't look at it. Shut your eyes, Marion. Don't look at it, no matter what happens!"

 @thomasjkenney1024: Ha!

 I suppose you're right though. I just threw all my money outside and suddenly I can see the pictures. They're... beautiful.

 All I see is an image of a formula hub…

 I thought this was if it isn't then thats crap.

 I believe the Pro 5 DH 148 is only 7 speed if i read that right.

 @Krispy-at-Go-Ride: Indeed you are right! I assumed it was 150/157. Great to see a 148 one! The dishing of most 148 hubs actually put me off buying a Demo Race Frame

 Also some DH bikes have 148mm rear ends, like the Transition TR11.

 I'd rather have a 148 hub like the Pro5 DH with a seven speed 11-46 or (maybe 10-42) cassette with high durability like Shimano Cues claims. I wouldn't mind the bigger jumps and could ride up nearly anything when paired with a 28-30t chainring. Now that would be something!

 @Muckal: the jump between sprockets on a 7 speed 11 - 46 cassette would be huge! I'm running 10 speed over that range and it works great, could drop to 9 - less than that I'm not sure how well it would work.

 Seems to me there could be peak loads on the drivetrain under hard compressions (hucks). Especially in case of a high pivot design when there is no lower pulley under the chainguide. Plus obviously this choice weights nothing whereas when going as fast as DH racers go, a high POE shouldn't be helpful either.

 DH pros can generate huge sprint power

 @motdrawde: He obviously means cog.

 @motdrawde: And XC guys don't? Somehow don't think that's the issue.

 @sherbet: I can imagine XC riders will benefit from a larger POE when working up a tech climb in a light gearing. Remember that the bigger the cassette sprocket, the more free crank rotation you'd get between hub engagements. As for sprint power (or I'd say it is more about torque than power if we're discussing in the context of loads on the freehub) I do believe that top athletes in an explosive discipline will be able to introduce bigger loads into the drivetrain than specialists in more of an endurance disciplines are. Apparently the bulk can get in the way. Former world champ BMX Twan van Gendt wanted to make the transition to XC mtb and mentioned he needs to lose a lot of bulk (muscle) to become a competitive XC racer. I haven't heard from him in the mean time though, not sure whether he'll even be able to successfully make the transition. For a short while when 4X racing was removed from the WC calendar, Anneke Beerten also dabbled with XC racing but it didn't really work out either. Luckily enduro racing popped up as a saviour. In the current state of the sport however, people don't really have anywhere to flee anymore.

Either way, I digress. TL;DR: Yes I think top riders in an explosive discipline are able to apply bigger loads into the drivetrain than top racers from and endurance discipline can.

 @vinay: If you legitimately feel DH racers have stronger sprints than XC and road dudes, you're delusional and I'm not going to sugar coat it.

 @vinay: Doing a quick bike check on Hart vs Schurter, Hart's DH is running 165 cranks and a 34t chainring x 24t max in the rear while Schurter's XC bike is 170 cranks and a 38t chainring x 52t max in the rear, so roughly double the freehub torque on Schurter's bike for the same pedal force. I can believe that DH riders have a higher instantaneous force, but I'm a little surprised it would be so much to cause a change in engagement points.

 @sherbet: Nah, to be honest I'd expect the BMX racers and track cyclists to be able to apply the biggest loads but I wouldn't know where the DH riders stand. My comment there was a bit of guesswork indeed. And I think it is irrelevant as I expect again that the biggest loads on the freehub are when the rider lands a huck and the rear axle moves rearwards as mentioned in my initial post. It would give a short yank on that chain so much stronger than any rider can apply through JRA.

@WhoTookIt: Yeah, that's one way of looking at it, judging the rider by the gearing they run on very different courses. I don't run a gearing that big so I don't know for sure, but my impression is that people typically use the lightest gear for actually sitting and spinning rather than apply max force to get up the steepest of the steepest inclines. Though if so indeed, that would be where that hub would see the max torque.

 @sherbet: watts and torque have a lot to do with weight. XC and road sprinters have phenomenal strength to weight ratios, but DH racers are oftentimes much much bigger and can produce more watts in absolute terms. Nathan Rennie famously produced 2080 watts in a power test at the Australian Institute of Science and was offered a position on the AUS national team racing track bikes. By contrast, Mark Cavendish (who's likely the greatest road sprinter to ever live) produces a max of around 1600 watts. I can do 1600 watts, and I'm nobody. Doesn't hurt that I'm 189 cm and 86 kilos, whereas Cav is 175 cm and 70 kg.

 @TEAM-ROBOT: And Chris Hoy can hit 2600. DH racers absolutely are fit athletes and can put down efforts, but XC and road racing revolve around this.

My point, for as much as everyone would like to pull at semantics, is that this hub isn't a reduced POE due to rider output. Your average weekend rider is your average weekend rider, DH or all mountain. I'd be interested to know what the reason was.

 @vinay: I'm with you on this one, there sure seems to be a lot more snapped chains on DH world cups than any other disciplines. Most pro teams put a new chain for every race weekend .
I know some broken chains come form bashing the ring, and some from sloppy shifting, but it's still an indication of high torque.

 @vinay: also, I don't think smooth application of high torque is the issue with ratchet failure, unlike broken axles, where constantly bending them under torque leads to fatigue cracks. Ratchets have trouble with extremely sudden load, when only the first of the supposedly synchronized pawls engagés.( In that moment, it prys the axle and ring sideways.It's not like lubricants are always distributed in the exact same way, it's en environnement conducive to making waves that can affect pawls or grease.

 Lower POE count helps with the dreaded pedal kickback.

 @Muckal: This^^^. Dh bikes are much more susceptible to chain induced feedback simply because the travel numbers are substantially higher than trail bikes and even enduro bikes.

Generally speaking having 6 pawls vs 4 pawls isn't going to make a significant different. Provided the force applied is equal at all places, there is more than enough strength with 3 pawls engaging vs 6. Hadley has been making bulletproof hubs that rival any hub today in quality and reliability. I would say even chris king, with the exception where Chris King wins in bearings by a fair margin, but they do so with every single brand out there today.
No no, dh bikes just ride better with lower engagement hubs in general. However, I think 50pts is minim, and 72pts is max from my own personal opinion.

 @motdrawde: according to wattbike - *the* highest watts are produced by BMX and DH pros - even higher than track cyclers because they use very tall gearing (for high speed) that isn't quite optimal for peak watts at the start. We are talking about 2200 watts for ~3 seconds.

 @Motivated: That's interesting. The other thing I was thinking about is how many different times DH racers sprint in one race. It could be as many as 20 separate sprint efforts in one race run, which means the pawls in their hubs are being subjected to more high impact accelerating forces (from not pedaling to pedaling), vs. road racing where there's typically only one true max-effort sprint per race. Seems like that would be especially hard on pawls, especially when you add the constant impact of hub engagement from suspension movement.

 Current pro5 Hubs only have a 1mm spoke deviation, so building with the same length is fine.

 @benpinnick: that seems a bit nuts… why not just make it the same both sides?

 These kinda look like Big'uns...

 @boozed: it’s wide enough for riding, since they’re walking anything really big.

 @boozed: legitimately curious, are you pedaling up steeper pitches on a DH?

 Anecdotally, I've only had bad luck with star ratchet hubs failing in catastrophic, non-repairable ways. Happy to see a lack of complete homogenization.

 @j-t-g: I’ve never seen one fail….back to wrenching at shops in the 1990’s when they were still Hugis.

I’ve seen a whole lot of broken drive rings and owls on Hopes and i9s. And a bunch of broken rear axles on i9s to boot.

Any product will have a user who sees a failure, but some products are notably durable. DT star ratchet hubs (their pawl hubs weren’t durable), Thomson stems and rigid posts, and SPD pedals all fall in the category of much more reliable than similar products from other brands.

 @j-t-g: pawls, not owls…..

 @wyorider: just cos you've never seen it doesn't mean it doesn't happen. When I got my eeb 4 years ago, the stock dt 350 rear hub lasted 32 miles before it catastrophically failed, to the point dt didn't know what had gone wrong and it got replaced. I've broken every part of a bike at some point, most parts multiple times, but I've only ever had that one rear hub fail.

 @inked-up-metalhead: so many Bontrager hub failures. I have one I can’t get apart, it spins freely in both directions but it can’t be slid apart. I used to break the old style shimano freehubs that use the big hollow axle bolt to attach quite frequently, or tear the side of the hub out.

 @j-t-g: +1 for diversification. Curious what happened? I grease the star ratchet when it gets louder, and never had issues, except for overgreasing, which was on me.

 @inked-up-metalhead: Broped puts waaaay more torque through the drivetrain. Which is why DT now has a version for motorbikes.

 @ultimatist: both involved the hub side ratchet spinning freely in the hub. Early budget dt Swiss were press in so that didn't help. But later I managed to do it to a thread in one too. Ironically based on other comments here, I've had excellent luck with multiple bontrager hubs over years of use.

 @wyorider: right, but 32 miles in eco? There's plenty of riders who can put out far more than that, I was on an easy first ride to learn range etc, pedalling along on a relatively flat track and it just stopped transferring power and started crunching instead. The ratchet rings were perfectly fine, it was deeper in the hub than that. And the replacement did around 1200 miles before I killed the rim, the hub is still 100% useable, I've just not had chance to ride 15 miles with it to get it a new rim laced up on it (I don't drive, hence the eeb).

 I know that Tairin Wheels, when they were developing their new silent hubs, had initially gone for a star ratchet design, but ended up going with pawls, because of issues manufacturing the ratchets to spec.

 yes, very good question, interested in response.

 I guess you can install sram 7 speed DH cassette, just removing the guide disc. For Shimano, any 9 to 11 speed sgould fit removen the last few gears.

I'm curious about how to fit XD 7 speed SRAM cassette(xg-795 dh), is that possible to remove the guide disc??

 Check out the pro2 trials hub from...the pro2 era

 You sound like you're from Lancashire with that attitude.

 Which DH bikes are going 148 that you know of? I just curious because know of 1 DH bikes are using 148, but quite a few are using 150 and 157 still. Is it just the TR11?

 @Phaethon85: Specialized Demo Race

 @max-power: Thanks. It will be interesting to see if more DH bikes end up on the 148mm platform. I don't mind this because I'd like to have a wheelset that works for on an enduro bike and a downhill bike.

 @Phaethon85: supernought

 @Phaethon85: Frameworks too

 @Phaethon85: GT Fury

 Aurums been doing it for a long while now.