Chris King R45

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Multebear
Posts: 1395
Joined: Sat May 02, 2015 10:11 pm

by Multebear

BdaGhisallo wrote:
Fri Sep 06, 2019 6:17 pm
Multebear wrote:
Wed Sep 04, 2019 9:32 pm
CK R45 are definitely some of the nicest hubs out there. Probably the raciest hubs of the lot. Not the lightest, but that's because they are well built. AFAIK the bearings are proprietary, and the hubs require regular servicing. The freehub body is soft aluminum, and eventually your cassettes will leave bitemarks so deep, that you need to replace the freehub body.

WI T11 are top hubs as well. They have standard bearings and they are pretty as hell. They have ti freehub body, which doesn't get chewed up from cassettes. I'd aim for WI T11 instead of CK.
What do you think of the bearing preload adjustment on the T11's. I had two sets of them and I was never able to master it. OTOH, I found the pre-load on the R45 much easier to adjust.
Must admit I never dared to touch it. Had LBS fix it if there were problems. But I remember them saying something about it not being the best solution.

zinedrei
Posts: 139
Joined: Wed Oct 11, 2017 7:36 am

by zinedrei

hkgmatt wrote:
Sat Sep 07, 2019 2:22 am
I'm not a fan of the CK R45 hub on disc wheels because you need two different tools to remove the rotor on the rear and the front. You also need to remove the end cap in the rear to remove the rotor. Obviously not an issue if you rarely do that or only do it at home but I travel with my bike several times a year and got a bit tired of bringing extra tools. I'm changing to a different set of wheels with DT240 hubs.
are you referring to the lockring?
my r45 centerlock use the same lockring on front and back (shimano made).
perhaps you use diff lockrings due to frame requirements hence diff tools needed?

by Weenie


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dim
Posts: 596
Joined: Fri Oct 13, 2017 11:25 am
Location: Cambridge UK

by dim

I have Chris King R45 hubs (the upgraded version with ceramic bearings) .... these are laced to HED Belgium Plus rims with Sapim CX Ray spokes. I use these wheels on my Trek Emonda SL6 and am using Conti 5000 TL (tubeless tyres) at the moment

love them ..... only drawback is that twice a year I have to have them serviced by my LBS (he is an authorised Chris King service guy) .... costs £40 per service (£80 per year), so bear this in mind if you are like me and don't know how to service the hubs yourself
Trek Emonda SL6
Miyata One Thousand

hkgmatt
Posts: 48
Joined: Sun Apr 08, 2018 9:17 am

by hkgmatt

zinedrei wrote:
Sun Sep 08, 2019 1:20 am
hkgmatt wrote:
Sat Sep 07, 2019 2:22 am
I'm not a fan of the CK R45 hub on disc wheels because you need two different tools to remove the rotor on the rear and the front. You also need to remove the end cap in the rear to remove the rotor. Obviously not an issue if you rarely do that or only do it at home but I travel with my bike several times a year and got a bit tired of bringing extra tools. I'm changing to a different set of wheels with DT240 hubs.
are you referring to the lockring?
my r45 centerlock use the same lockring on front and back (shimano made).
perhaps you use diff lockrings due to frame requirements hence diff tools needed?
Yes, my rear R45 uses a lockring with "outside" teeth (SM-HB20) while the front uses the more standard (for me) SM-RT81 with "inside" teeth. I had assumed that this was due to requirements of the CK hub but it seems not since yours use the same lockring. My wheels did come with the bike but I can't detect a frame-related reason for the difference since I can mount other wheels with the SM-RT81 lockring front and rear.

saba
Posts: 68
Joined: Wed Sep 06, 2017 1:40 am

by saba

Proprietary bearings = to hell with that. A little company out of Oregon can produce better bearings than major manufacturers like NTN/FAG/SKF/etc? Don't believe it.

zinedrei
Posts: 139
Joined: Wed Oct 11, 2017 7:36 am

by zinedrei

saba wrote:
Sat Sep 21, 2019 1:56 pm
Proprietary bearings = to hell with that. A little company out of Oregon can produce better bearings than major manufacturers like NTN/FAG/SKF/etc? Don't believe it.
being major doesn't mean better. it's all about facts. if you have factual information that CK bearings are not at par or better, then it's better to have facts to prove it.

same goes for frame manufacturers like Giant. they are a major producer but does it mean that their products are better that those from small companies like Bastion?

saba
Posts: 68
Joined: Wed Sep 06, 2017 1:40 am

by saba

zinedrei wrote:
Sat Sep 21, 2019 2:27 pm
saba wrote:
Sat Sep 21, 2019 1:56 pm
Proprietary bearings = to hell with that. A little company out of Oregon can produce better bearings than major manufacturers like NTN/FAG/SKF/etc? Don't believe it.
being major doesn't mean better. it's all about facts. if you have factual information that CK bearings are not at par or better, then it's better to have facts to prove it.
It's up to CK to justify them as being on-par or better.

But I'll put it this way: NTN/FAG/SKF/NSK/Schaeffler have hundreds of years of research+manufacturing experience between them, employing thousands of scientists and engineers, making fundamental industrial lego parts. They're used in machinery with unit costs into the tens of millions. Their products are fully documented, blueprinted, and upfront with their tolerances, designs, materials, wear-rates, etc.

Versus.

Some guy in a metal warehouse out in the 'burbs making dinky bearings for boring bicycles, no information released except "it's proprietary yo".

gwerziou
Posts: 347
Joined: Wed Feb 20, 2019 7:25 pm
Location: Ballard, WA

by gwerziou

The sound of CK hubs drove me nuts; I found it distinctly distracting and annoying but as always, YMMV.

I’ve had DT 240s on my main set of cross wheels forever and they are ultra-reliable. My only critique is that they are a bit slow to engage. I have a Duke Racing Baccara SLS2 Disc wheelset on order for my CX bike with the new DT Swiss 180 hubs with the Ratchet EXP mechanism. The EXP should get faster engagement than the 240s and they’ve moved the bearings outward, so we’ll see how that works.
I’ve had great experiences with Campagnolo hubs, really superb - but more recently I’ve been very focused on CX and there’s not so much Campy in the cross and gravel world.
The new Mavic hubs with ‘360 drive’ or whatever it’s called are very interesting. Withe the DT Swiss/Hugi patent running out on the original ratchet drive Mavic has essentially copied it and come up with something not too different, again with a bit faster engagement.
• A hi-zoot bike, pretty sweet
• An old bike, more fun than the new one actually
• Unicycle, no brand name visible

dim
Posts: 596
Joined: Fri Oct 13, 2017 11:25 am
Location: Cambridge UK

by dim

gwerziou wrote:
Sun Sep 22, 2019 5:32 am
The sound of CK hubs drove me nuts; I found it distinctly distracting and annoying but as always, YMMV.

they only make noise when you don't pedal .... so if the sound annoys you, pedal more :lol:
Trek Emonda SL6
Miyata One Thousand

zinedrei
Posts: 139
Joined: Wed Oct 11, 2017 7:36 am

by zinedrei

saba wrote:
Sun Sep 22, 2019 12:34 am
It's up to CK to justify them as being on-par or better.

But I'll put it this way: NTN/FAG/SKF/NSK/Schaeffler have hundreds of years of research+manufacturing experience between them, employing thousands of scientists and engineers, making fundamental industrial lego parts. They're used in machinery with unit costs into the tens of millions. Their products are fully documented, blueprinted, and upfront with their tolerances, designs, materials, wear-rates, etc.

Versus.

Some guy in a metal warehouse out in the 'burbs making dinky bearings for boring bicycles, no information released except "it's proprietary yo".
i have had no issues with CK hubs for both mtb and road applications.
again, if you don't have factual information that CK bearings are bad, then it's just hearsay.

there can be more than 1 company that produces good bearings so it's not really a contest on who is better since both are good.

have you even owned and used CK hubs?
seems you have had some bad experience with them

CLEAR
Posts: 241
Joined: Tue Jul 24, 2012 2:20 pm

by CLEAR

I had r45 hubs when purchased a second hand gen2 enve laced to it. No particular issue with r45, other than when i wanted to work on it, i found out i needed special tools, which of course i never had, since im just a home mechanic first time attempting to service them.

Not looking into investing on new special tools, i then sold the wheelset. Went with older Lew rims laced to WI T11, and another generic deep carbon rims laced to DT240. Both easy to service and maintain if need be, but so far so good. Even the freehubs are cheap to replace when needed. Again, based on ease of access to them since i no longer trust local bike shops around here, long story for another day

mothetgoo
Posts: 11
Joined: Fri Jul 17, 2020 10:50 pm

by mothetgoo

gwerziou wrote:
Sun Sep 22, 2019 5:32 am
The sound of CK hubs drove me nuts; I found it distinctly distracting and annoying but as always, YMMV.

I’ve had DT 240s on my main set of cross wheels forever and they are ultra-reliable. My only critique is that they are a bit slow to engage. I have a Duke Racing Baccara SLS2 Disc wheelset on order for my CX bike with the new DT Swiss 180 hubs with the Ratchet EXP mechanism. The EXP should get faster engagement than the 240s and they’ve moved the bearings outward, so we’ll see how that works.
I’ve had great experiences with Campagnolo hubs, really superb - but more recently I’ve been very focused on CX and there’s not so much Campy in the cross and gravel world.
The new Mavic hubs with ‘360 drive’ or whatever it’s called are very interesting. Withe the DT Swiss/Hugi patent running out on the original ratchet drive Mavic has essentially copied it and come up with something not too different, again with a bit faster engagement.
@gwerziou did you end up taking delivery of the Cx Wheelset with the new DT 180? I have a new Wheelset in the works (in my mind) and I am interested in those hubs but there is very little info on the internet by anyone who has actually used them. If love to hear how they've been.

abatty
Posts: 28
Joined: Wed Jun 24, 2020 1:20 pm
Location: Hampshire, UK

by abatty

I've WI T11s and the good thing about them is that they are really nicely engineered, roll well, and are simple to entirely strip down and service. However, the factory fitted Enduro bearings are poor and only lasted a season in the UK. So, I've replaced these with SKF (again a fairly simple job for the home mechanic with www.bearingprotools.com) which are still spinning perfectly after 5,000mi. I also use marine grease on the externally exposed bearing seals as there's no shielding and Shimano premium hub grease on the pawls, springs and ratchet ring.

The pre-load adjustment on front and rear can take some playing with to get right. I've found with my rear that for some reason it doesn't need pressure from a socket as this results in too much load and I've not had to adjust the pre-load at all on either hub since installing the improved bearings.

Overall, I really like them and they look great!

gwerziou
Posts: 347
Joined: Wed Feb 20, 2019 7:25 pm
Location: Ballard, WA

by gwerziou

mothetgoo wrote:
Fri Sep 04, 2020 11:17 am

@gwerziou did you end up taking delivery of the Cx Wheelset with the new DT 180? I have a new Wheelset in the works (in my mind) and I am interested in those hubs but there is very little info on the internet by anyone who has actually used them. If love to hear how they've been.
Yes I did, some time ago. Those hubs have been fantastic and I can't find any fault with them whatsoever. Oh, one issue is that I switched to a Campagnolo drivetrain and the endcap for a Campy freehub, unlike the SRAM one it replaced, does not have a lip on the end for easy removal and I ended up having to go to pliers and then a vice to get it off again after I dumbly left a part out when I quickly installed it. Left a few marks on it. This is not a particular fault of this hubset, however.
• A hi-zoot bike, pretty sweet
• An old bike, more fun than the new one actually
• Unicycle, no brand name visible

by Weenie


Visit starbike.com Online Retailer for HighEnd cycling components
Great Prices ✓    Broad Selection ✓    Worldwide Delivery ✓

www.starbike.com



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