Folding bikes - are hub gears worth it?

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Strolls

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I've recently been thinking about buying a folding bike. The Dahon ones look ok.

eBay prices depend on patience, luck and the day of the week, but I've been watching these listings for some time and generally it looks like you can get an ok Dahon with derailleur gears for about £150 second hand, and one with hub gears for about £250.

Examples:


Any thoughts on whether hubs gears are worth the extra dosh?

Either they're more resistant to rust in the saltwater environment, or they're more expensive to replace when they inevitably succumb to it. Any idea which?

Thanks for your thoughts,

Stroller.
 
I've never had the luxury of corrosion. I get through a bike a year; theft, being blown into the drink in a gale, crushed to death under a gangway.

They are like cameras - they wont last long in a boaty environment.
 
Our Bromptons have both hub and derailleur gears, three of one and two of the other. They are now 13 years old, showing their age a bit but working perfectly. I would not say that either gear system is noticeably better than the other. The derailleurs take a bit of lubricant from time to time but that's about it.
 
I chose hub gears for onboard on the basis that there is less 'delicate' machinery to catch on things as they go ashore. I dont find them any more trouble than derailleurs, they are Dahons.
 
Strolls said:
I've recently been thinking about buying a folding bike. The Dahon ones look ok.

eBay prices depend on patience, luck and the day of the week, but I've been watching these listings for some time and generally it looks like you can get an ok Dahon with derailleur gears for about £150 second hand, and one with hub gears for about £250.

Examples:


Any thoughts on whether hubs gears are worth the extra dosh?

Either they're more resistant to rust in the saltwater environment, or they're more expensive to replace when they inevitably succumb to it. Any idea which?

Thanks for your thoughts,

Stroller.
Click to expand...

My Brompton has a 3speed hub gear which is definately worth having. Bike lives on board all year, gets an annual clean and lube and is over 20 years old. I beleive that in the long term hub gears are more durable and less vulnerable to damage.

Www.solocoastalsailing.co.uk
 
Hub gears are completely enclosed and filled with oil, so definitely much better protected from corrosion. But that matters little, because you still have a chain and sprockets (except for some modern belt drive bicycles, which you might want to consider), so you still have to do roughly the same effort to protect things. I would buy a hub gear every time for its other advantages, but not because there are a few less parts going rusty.

Instead, you should marinize your bicycle when getting it. I removed all oil from the chain and sprockets (degreaser spray) and applied waterproof (silicone) grease instead. There is not a spot of corrosion on the drive train after two years, and since the chain has a cover (bit like a flexi cable conduit, with a gap where the sprockets go - photo below), the grease attracts very little dirt and only needs renewing perhaps once a year.

Do avoid steel bits. My bike is mostly aluminium (frame and parts) and has almost no corrosion, except for a few steel nuts and bolts on the brakes, which I've coated in Waxoyl and will replace with stainless ones if they get worse.

Never leave the bike out in saltspray - the whole point of having a folding bike is so it can fit into a locker after all, so put it there. Covers don't really work when the spray is flying in all directions. Never leave it in marina bike stands - at least the ones here in Brighton are highly optimised for exposure and rapidly convert nice bicycles into sad piles of rust (every now and then a guy in a truck with bolt croppers comes and cuts the abandoned wrecks off their locks, leaving nothing but a rusty broken chain behind). If you do get salt on it (salty puddles along the coast etc.), hose it down with fresh water ASAP. The waterproof grease won't mind and the bike won't rust away in the locker until you next use it. Bit of WD40 now and then doesn't hurt either.

Or do what I've observed here once: Buy a nice new folding bike. Leave it on deck in front of the mast with a cheap cover. Go away for winter. The cover gets blown away in the first gale that comes along. In the winter months, the bicycle quickly turns into a useless pile of rust, leaving a truly impressive rust stain on your white non-slip gelcoat, running down all over the entire foredeck and topsides. Come back, throw your now useless bike into the marina bin and spend days trying to get the rust off your boat. ;)

Tern-Link-Uno-chain-guard.jpg
 
vyv_cox said:
Our Bromptons have both hub and derailleur gears, three of one and two of the other. They are now 13 years old, showing their age a bit but working perfectly. I would not say that either gear system is noticeably better than the other. The derailleurs take a bit of lubricant from time to time but that's about it.
Click to expand...

We bought the same six speed Bromptons in 2004 and they are still going strong. Both sets of gears work fine. They get next to no maintenance but we did put some paint on the rusty bits of frame last year....... Excellent bikes but almost twice what we paid for them if you buy them now
 
Strolls said:
I've recently been thinking about buying a folding bike. The Dahon ones look ok.

eBay prices depend on patience, luck and the day of the week, but I've been watching these listings for some time and generally it looks like you can get an ok Dahon with derailleur gears for about £150 second hand, and one with hub gears for about £250.

Examples:


Any thoughts on whether hubs gears are worth the extra dosh?

Either they're more resistant to rust in the saltwater environment, or they're more expensive to replace when they inevitably succumb to it. Any idea which?

Thanks for your thoughts,

Stroller.
Click to expand...

How much heavier are hubs?
 
As a newbie to sailing but a cyclist of 40 years I'd go for a hub gear for a folding bike for the boat.

Hubs are heavier and marginally less efficient, but there will be less losses in the drive train (straight chainline). On a folder you probably won't notice any difference because bike is not optimised for performance. Hubs are pretty indestructable.

But the main reason I'd go for a hub is the reduction in (fragile) oily sticky outy things designed to ruin my clothing every time I wanted to get it on or off the boat.

Bromptons are brilliant BTW, well worth the money if you want to go that expensive.
 
Yngmar said:
Hub gears are completely enclosed and filled with oil, so definitely much better protected from corrosion. But that matters little, because you still have a chain and sprockets (except for some modern belt drive bicycles, which you might want to consider), so you still have to do roughly the same effort to protect things. I would buy a hub gear every time for its other advantages, but not because there are a few less parts going rusty.

Instead, you should marinize your bicycle when getting it. I removed all oil from the chain and sprockets (degreaser spray) and applied waterproof (silicone) grease instead. There is not a spot of corrosion on the drive train after two years, and since the chain has a cover (bit like a flexi cable conduit, with a gap where the sprockets go - photo below), the grease attracts very little dirt and only needs renewing perhaps once a year.

Do avoid steel bits. My bike is mostly aluminium (frame and parts) and has almost no corrosion, except for a few steel nuts and bolts on the brakes, which I've coated in Waxoyl and will replace with stainless ones if they get worse.

Never leave the bike out in saltspray - the whole point of having a folding bike is so it can fit into a locker after all, so put it there. Covers don't really work when the spray is flying in all directions. Never leave it in marina bike stands - at least the ones here in Brighton are highly optimised for exposure and rapidly convert nice bicycles into sad piles of rust (every now and then a guy in a truck with bolt croppers comes and cuts the abandoned wrecks off their locks, leaving nothing but a rusty broken chain behind). If you do get salt on it (salty puddles along the coast etc.), hose it down with fresh water ASAP. The waterproof grease won't mind and the bike won't rust away in the locker until you next use it. Bit of WD40 now and then doesn't hurt either.

Or do what I've observed here once: Buy a nice new folding bike. Leave it on deck in front of the mast with a cheap cover. Go away for winter. The cover gets blown away in the first gale that comes along. In the winter months, the bicycle quickly turns into a useless pile of rust, leaving a truly impressive rust stain on your white non-slip gelcoat, running down all over the entire foredeck and topsides. Come back, throw your now useless bike into the marina bin and spend days trying to get the rust off your boat. ;)

Tern-Link-Uno-chain-guard.jpg
Click to expand...
What a neat idea! Where do you get those and what are they called?
 
My wife has a trek with hub gears. The gear change started to play up so I took it to my local bicycle shop (A huge independent selling mainly road bikes and mountain bikes). They returned the bike unfixed declaring that they did not know how to service it.
 
KAL said:
What a neat idea! Where do you get those and what are they called?
Click to expand...

We've already been told what they are called (FreeDrive chain cover) and I looked them up via Google. But it strikes me that they are clever so long as no dirty or even clean water is chucked at the chain. Else almost impossible to dry out and thus ideal for starting rust...

Mike.
 
mjcoon said:
We've already been told what they are called (FreeDrive chain cover) and I looked them up via Google. But it strikes me that they are clever so long as no dirty or even clean water is chucked at the chain. Else almost impossible to dry out and thus ideal for starting rust...

Mike.
Click to expand...
It won't work on bikes with a chain tensioner such as a Brompton. But then Bromptons are unique in folding with the chain inside so tend not to mark things.
 
Seven Spades said:
My wife has a trek with hub gears. The gear change started to play up so I took it to my local bicycle shop (A huge independent selling mainly road bikes and mountain bikes). They returned the bike unfixed declaring that they did not know how to service it.
Click to expand...

To be fair they are a bit of a nightmare. Lots of newspaper on the kitchen table and put the kettle on.

Last time I stripped one to replace the 3 bearing sets I discovered the race on the shell was like the surface of the moon making it an uneconomic repair. Of course I'd already replace the other two bearings by that time.

I think it's somewhere in the garden.

PS: With your wife's bike it will almost certainly be out of adjustment or a sticky cable. You really have to go some to wear out a hub gear.
 
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