Hello,

The WTB front hub that came with my Marin Riftzone has finally given up the ghost after 17 months of hammer.

I'm thinking of getting a Hope hub, or even one of the shiny Chris King ones.

Any advice?

Thanks,

Ben

get a king, never replace it ever again :-)

Hello,

But is it worth it? The differece in price betwen a Hope XC and King is £80....

Worth it without a doubt. The quality of the bearings is totally incomparable, the King will last forever, they roll really smoothly, they're light, and they come in pretty colours.

Get the King, it's not even worth thinking about!

so they're worth the £80 difference for the front (if they do last twice as long and look twice as shiney) but what about the £160 between an ISO and Hope XC rear?

Yep, worth every penny.

There are 4 bearings in the rear of a Hope XC hub, that's £24 to change the lot if you use the original Hope ones, which are nowhere near as good as King ones. They are unlikely to last much longer than a year, so that's £24 per year, a King is warrantied for 10 years.

Wanna do the maths?

I know plenty of people with Hope hubs and I have a pair myself and I have to disagree with you about the lifespan of them . Mine are 4 years old and haven't needed any maintenance and that seems to be the general story with Hope hubs , the quick releases on the other hand are pretty crap .

QRs are shite, but you don't get any with the hubs, in either case, so it's largely irrelevant!

I have never known anyone to replace the bearings in a King (and I work in a bike shop), we replace Hopes weekly, admittedly there are more Hopes out there, but 1 year was just a figure I would suggest as an average. I have to say I don't know anyone who's got 4 years out of them.

The other thing that I dislike about Hopes if that if you now try to take it apart you will likely find it's seized together, unless you've taken it apart regularly and kept it all nice and clean.

I personally think King's are worth every penny, I use them, like I use XTR and X.0, I'm not going to justify it to everyone, I think they're better than anything else I've seen or used, and that's a lot of things!

I managed to seize my CK rear hub after a year but had the problem sorted out FOC. Don't know any other manufacturer who would do that.

And you're the first person I've ever met who's had problems DP!

Mine are just over a year old now, but have seen some serious use, and they're still absolutely perfect, and there's not a speck of grit in them, all the other bearings on the bike have died!

I'll definitely be getting another set for the S-Works, just think of them as an investment!

I vote for hope on the front.
Very easy to maintain, and out of the 3 sets I have, I have never needed to replace a bearing.
I can believe that CK is even better, but the support from Hope is very good if you need it, and the price difference is very sobering!
Alternatively get on a plane to US and buy CK for hope prices ;-)

Nah, if you can afford it, get King, they're better. Whether it's worth the price difference you can decide, but they are better than Hopes, and people will (or certainly should be) unanimous on this!

9years & 11 months say theres a problem with the bearings, get new'uns, and you've got a hub that'll outlive several bikes

"Alternatively get on a plane to US and buy CK for hope prices ;-)"

is it cheap to import them then? surely they can't weigh that much (550g for f+r hub+headset)

Hope XCs are great hubs - have had a pair for 4 years with no maintenance required.
I open them up every few months just to check the innards are all in order.

Also imported a pair of ISO King hubs from the US last year and got my LBS to build em up for me. As soon as you take them out of the box, it's obvious that they are in a whole new world of quality.

*disappears to gaze lovingly at hubs*

What did you pay for the hubs, Box Fish?
I can't find them for less than £480.

I can't justify £260 more than Hope XC's (£220). How much did you save?

I paid £100 for a 24mm bolt thru ISO disc front hub (for Maverick SC32s) and £200 for the rear ISO disc hub. Free postage and I paid no import tax.

£300! That's irrissistable(sp?)! Did you just contact a shop out there?
thanks

*edit: and how long did it take to arrange/arrive?

I used the Interweb. Parcel took about a week to land on my desk at work. Oh, happy days.

Decisions, decisions....thanks for your views all!