Hats off for several reasons. 1) a topic not covered elsewhere; 2) thorough detail unlike many videos which skip or assume things are known to viewers; 3) excellent camerawork. While I strongly prefer a quiet bike, my is not so loud that i need to change anything. Hint to have zero clutch noise: never stop pedalling or get a fixie 😅😅

I think it's an annoying sound but it is a subtle way of alerting pedestrians on bike paths.

Thx!! Was about to replace my Hope Pro4 rear hub because the noise was like nails on a chalkboard. 1000% improvement!

Very timely vid as I'm just looking to upgrade my wheel hubs. Another fantastic job on your part with a very clear and well explained approach

Damn!! This video was a hell o a class, Mr. Oz 👏👏👏💪🤓! I prefer a quieter hub and my friends hat-me because of this 😹🙈

Good tip on using any grease you want from a range of thickness, rather than sticking with what manufacturers advise based on their long term testing.

Such a great and informative video especially for the average weekend warrior. Thank you very much!

Brilliant timimg on your video - i have 2 sets of wheels i am planning on servicing in the next few days and i was wondering how to quieten the set with the DT Swiss hub - then this video comes along ! Thankyou so much 👏👏😆

My road bikes all run very thick grease, keeps it quiet, and my MTB's I run thin for maximum noise to alert others on the track. I realised people don't listen too well in urban environments so the loud ratchet noise didn't help vs a bell.

Amazing as always! Hate the loud noise myself - but I have it on all my new carbon wheels as it apparently "the thing" when you buy a quality wheel set. 🤣

In some clutch freehubs you can easily add pawls. Sometimes that's the only difference between the cheap and the pricey hub models of that manufacturer. Older Bontrager come to mind.

Learned so much! Thank you!

I dont understand why people like that annoying loud sound of the free hub. I wish it was silent. Even when i ride alone, I dont wanna hear a buzzing noise in the background.

Brilliant video. My Mavic Aksium hub that I've had since new sounds like a chainsaw, so it's good to hear that it's not too dissimilar to some of the hubs here.

by far the best video about hub sound I have ever seen !

Thanks for sharing 😊 Found your channel this weekend. Subbed. Now watched 5-ish vids. You Sir may very well run the best🚴channel out there. Well done.

I've recently bought a bike with a DT Swiss pawl hub, whereas I've had a Mavic ratchet hub before. The points of engagement difference is very noticeable for mountain biking, however the DT Swiss is literally almost silent and, to be honest, I'm willing to sacrifice the points of engagement for the ability to go down a trail and only hear the wind and the tyres.

Mapdec featured Corima wheels recently. Completely silent. Beautiful set of wheels as well.

Great video, just one thing... Better to use a small brush instead of cotton swab, cause swab leave cotton hairs behind, as seen on 9:00

New favorite channel.

definitely going to do this with an Easton Echo hub. cows stop giving milk when i ride by

Excellent video - very informative and straight forward.

Love the onyx. Silent! ❤️ I usually repack grease on my Shimano hub and it silences even more ❤️

Thank you. I thought there was no cure for screaming rear hubs.

Viscous grease is not recommended at low temperatures; the hub may spin without engaging.

thank you! That video helps me a lot.

I find it cheaper and easier to use a playing card and clothes peg...

great video! definitely putting soe 000 grease in my dt swiss hubs. coming from hope pro 4, dt swiss are essentially silent

I PREFER ZERO NOISE. IT IS OK FOR 15 MINTES OR SO THEN IT BECOMES A PISS OFF.

I’ve been using Phil’s Tenacious. It keeps it fairly quiet. From your video I need to up the thickness.

I have a pawl and spring hub with 72 points of engagement. And I really regret buying those wheels, it sounds so loud and obnoxious. I will definitely try taking the hub apart to quiet it down using your method, thanks for this video!

Thanks the the video!

Excellent content!

There was a time when the better the freewheel, the quieter.

What a great vid, thanks mate!

I like quiet ticking freehub like those of Shimano Sora. Recently I had my Novatec hub serviced after 5000 km. Replaced all bearing with mix of NTN and Ezo semi contact type, and re-grease the freehub with Finish Line lithium grease. Now it is quieter and roll very smoothly. This is after I noticed there is play in rear wheel and freehub was louder than when first installed. I think NL 1 grease is perfect for freehub, not too heavy and not overly light, like those made by SKF.

I've started using those foil BBQ trays for when I'm servicing hubs or anything with small parts that can fall.

A very good informational video. The sound that a person desires should have absolutely no bearing ( no punn intended ) on the final result of proper maintenance.

Outstanding content. Thanks a lot

Oz - thanks again for a great video. Wondering if you have a recommendation for an affordable set of 700c wheels for rim brakes with decent aero profile. Thx!

Un gran trabajo, muchas gracias, saludos desde Chile

Great technical video. But here's the elephant in the room...cyclists who want louder rear hubs are no different to motorcycle riders with loud exhausts, particularly Harley riders. It's a hear me, look at me ego driven attitude. They think it's great, but everyone else thinks they're a tosser. So if you want to be a tosser, or heaven forbid a wanker, go loud. If you think it's for safety reasons, you're hiding behind the real reason you want noise 🤔

Great video! 👏

Wheel bearing grease or motor assembly grease is best for use in freehubs. It's designed to stay in place and will take much longer to thin out needing more.

Great info again Steve, a question though. My star ring from Elite only contains one spring but the star ring you showed had two.

I'd quite like my hub to be silent. When I can justify one of those sprag clutch hubs I will, but grease is cheaper last time I checked ebay.

Just an observation, the thick grease will get dispersed from the star ratchet face over time, so you will need to reapply periodically to keep the noise down. Also, too much grease can also prevent the ratchet from engaging, so don't dump the whole container of grease in there.

A few years ago I used synthetic spray oil for my BMX hubs! What a beauty that was

If your freehub body has 4 or 6 pawls, you can shorten 2 or 3 opposing pawls on a grinder by half of the distance between the ratchet teeth. This adjusts the 'phase' that opposing pawls engage. Ali Clarkson has a video on doing this.

Greta video. Thanks.

Nice Video! What you say is a good grease for max. Sound like 00 or 000? Which one exactly can you recommend?

This has been the unsolved mystery after I saw a guy using DT Swiss 240EXP hub(which is same as mine) but his hub was completely silent. Thanks, guru!

Great for Mtn. Biking: In 1985 one of my riding buddies pointed out that one can get close to wildlife much easier with a heavily greased hub.

I changed mine thanks to playing card and a clothes pin- when i was 7🙄

I'd add that -if your hub has like 6 or 4 pawls, removing even half of them while keeping balanced spread of pawls on the hub - won't do anything bad, and decreases the sound significantly. -using thick grease should work, but only temporary, until grease layer won't be spreaded by engaging pawls. If it's too thick and stays to prevent spreading, I think there could be risk of not full pawl engagement. Also, sometimes finding the exact thickness value of the grease is major PITA

very well explained; thumbs up

I find this video "a-pawl-ing".

With a motorcycle mechanic friend , I ground a second set of cavities into a Novatec D042SB freehub at positions one third away , or 30 degrees away from the existing ones on CNC and we doubled the increments from 26 ( unmodified ) to 52 points per revolution as a result . We then added a second set of matched pawls .The conversion was successful and another friend is riding with those hubs in - situ with success . A NL- GI no 1 grade grease was applied before re - assembly at the beginning of this year .The hubs are still going strong today .

Are the two star rings interchangeable or do I need to keep track of which is which when I disassemble my hub? Are the two springs different?

11:42 - nah you will find those small parts again, but it will be a year later or when moving shop. Those buggers will haunt you on purpose. thx for a very informative video

Loud hubs are as annoying as my neighbours barking dog

Louder hub = safer for pedestrians. I commute along the canal and when its windy sometimes my bell doesn't cut through the wind. Winding the pedals in reverse let's them know there's a bike coming

Good to know that thicker grease will dull the annoying sound.

Master class thanks

They sound like a fishing reel, with a big bass on the hook, and it's stripping the drag.

I wonder how much the loudness of the spring sound boils down to the amount of force in the engagement springs. If the opposing teeth were slightly undercut, I think you wouldn't even need that much engagement to guarantee total engagement on pedaling. In that case, the only click would be from the tips of the opposing teeth passing over each other rather than the teeth hitting their full engagement points.

I love me some noisy hubs. Have the Zipp ZR1 hubs on a set of 404s

Thank You

DT Swiss always advise to use their red grease but greese is grease at the end of the day. Been using regular grease on my DT Swiss Pawl type hub for a while nice and quiet 😀

The noise is nice.. alerts others road or trail users u r coming.... fast... slow riders to give way.😂

A fantastic tutorial as always so thanks. Personally I enjoy the loudest clutch as it sure scares the hell out of drifters walking in the middle of a shared path.

Unfortunately, the sound reduction is nothing but a temporary thing. You can have better success with thin industrial greases, just make sure they are cold weather rated

Great video! I've read other places that grease is only a temporary quieting/fix. Is that true? If so, how long does it stay quiet?

I like it

Thanks for the video. Can you provide the link for the super team carbon wheels star racket upgrade kit?

There is eventually an other option : Keep on pedaling always ( humour ). It's a joke, I appreciated the very professional video.

Well done video

I remember stripping down my screw-on freewheels "blocks" in the eighties. This was usually because I'd need to replace a broken pawl and, as a self-funded teenage racing cyclist, the cost of a new block justified the time it took to do the repair! Just don't ask me about tying cotton loops around the pawls to keep them in place for re-assembly... lol :)

Very much bikes make a ridiculous loud noise. Do people like this? It's annoying, I'd say typical asocial behaviour. The story that it warns pedestrians proves this: yhou shoudl watch out for them, not the other way around! My bike is very silent, I really love it, but I seem one of the last bikers who love to be swift, silent, and attentive to my environment.

Boy this thumbnail can be hard to look at. I dont think enough was said about drag, and wear. The lighter oil will offer less drag, way more noise, and increased wear on the clutch, when compared to a heavy grease with good anti wearing properties. I think loud hubs became a trend because of younger people entering the sport and perceiving a loud hub to be "high performance" and the louder the more money you can justify spending on it. And then you have a company as old as time like shimano, and they patented a literally silent rear hub. Because cyclists know a quiet bike is a fast bike, no rubs, no squeaks they prioritize quiet and smooth components. I mean even shimano Deore is named that because someone admired the way deer move silently and quickly through thick woods, and thought that was an appropriate name for a mtb groupset.

Some of the people I ride with have bikes with freehubs that sound like a bagful of pissed off rattlesnake.

sound = wasted power

Is Slickoleum okay for hub pawls ?

Hi kindly help, I need the loudest hub which is the best and where can I buy.

Thicker grease leaves the pawls sticking so for safety purposes I use a lighter one.

The freewheel with thick grease full, to lubricate is not recommended. It can happen that the pulleys suddenly no longer grip. Then you step forward into the void and if you're lucky, you do not fly on the face.

7:13 you need a ratchet EXP kit

my wheel doesn't make much sound and I like it so silent . Idk why everyone wants a louder hub. Edit: Wow i didnt know its the grease that makes it silent, very informative thx

I don't understand why guys like a noisy free hub these days. When I used to race, I always lubed my hubs to be as quiet as possible so I could silently freehub in the draft and not let the guy in front think I was getting a free ride. Otherwise, I'd get a flicky of the 'ol elbow to take my turn.

Are any of those modern hubs made for rim brake wheels?

Onyx Vesper, how can it be that quiet ? how nevermind they are very expensive

Are those Contact Speed tyers?

it would be great to get links for it.

Loud freewheel hubs are absolutely annoying and unnecessary. What reason, other than attention, would you like an annoying noise while your riding.

Energy is required to make noise, and this energy is coming from the rotating wheel. Hence all the hub-chatter is slowing down wheel rotation. Maybe not a lot, but some. With all the concern about saving a few Watts here and there (e.g. aerodynamic socks), I don't understand why wheels that make such noise are commonplace.

thick grease better... wearing is minimized, noise too, i have make this SHIMANO SUPER-LOW MF-ZH 36-6 13-34T (megarange) in my city bike

Is it the old 370 Hub on the BMC?

I want to maje mine Louder

ahhh, no need for me to change the internal parts just to get a louder sound. I will still stay with my stock set-up. There will be no performance benefits to my riding should I make any changes.

That shirt is for Shimano employees only.