On a monty there is a coterless hub, it has worked well, even for like 5 ft drops, so, what is all of this pro splined hub about, at what point do you move up?
WOW!!! 5 ft you must have great forum, to not shatter tha hub!
I kinda think splined is overkill for most people.
The only hub I’ve ever damaged was a cottered hub, and upgrading to cotterless made it string enough for anything I needed.
i’ve completely bent the axle of a cotterless hub, and the highest drops i had done at that stage were up to 1ft - and i weigh hardly anything. splined hubs, however, are indestructible (at least that’s how i’ve found the qu-ax)
I tore the end clean off a UDC hub doing nothing bigger than 1 1/2 foot jumps, took a while but over time the ends twist off, Kh splines have never given me any troubles.
It slowly builds up over time. The more and more drops you do that are that large, the more bent and weird it gets, until it dies.
I was one of the peole that got to the point to where I was breaking equipment all the time, evne with excellent dropping technique, so I upgraded, and since then have slightly bent a set of cranks on a 7 footer, but thats it.
However, when riding a profile crankset vs a cotterles square taper hub, you can feel the difference in strenght just while riding, and the solid feeling is what I need for muni.
I think that it is a waste of money to spend anything on a uni that is not splined if you are planning on doing anything over 12". Cottered cranks have their place - but not on a trials un.
The standard square taper cotterless hub and crank assembly gets to be a liability for aggressive riding like muni and trials. The hubs aren’t strong enough because the diameter is too small. And you have constant problems with the cranks working loose. Unicycling puts a lot of back pressure on the cranks that doesn’t happen on bikes and that seems to make the cranks want to come loose. Anyone who does muni with square taper cotterless cranks eventually learns that they need to check the cranks for tightness before a ride and also carry a tool with them during the ride to tighten the cranks. That gets to be a pain and a reliability problem. Go on a large group muni ride where people are using cotterless cranks and it is very likely that at least one person will have a loose crank during the ride and need someone to tighten it for them. If they are really unlucky they’ll actually end up loosing the nut that holds the crank on.
Square tapered cotterless cranks are also not ideal if you like to change cranks a lot. It’s not good to change aluminum cranks repeatedly because every time you change the cranks you may end up pushing the cranks further onto the taper. Eventually making the cranks loose. Every time you change the cranks you also run the risk of not tightening them properly so they end up working loose during a ride. On a bike you tend to install a set of cranks and leave them be. On a unicycle you tend to try different crank lengths and it’s not unusual to change cranks regularly.
Splined cranks address those problems. They are very reliable. They aren’t going to work loose during a ride. They are stronger and stiffer. Changing cranks can be easier (brand new Profiles can be a bitch to change but once they’re used a bit they become easy to change). For me the reliability alone is worth makes the splined cranks worth it. I no longer worry about a loose crank during a ride. If I take a trip with my muni I no longer have to worry that a day’s ride may be wasted or ruined because of a loose crank. The added strength is also worth it.
Bigger people need stronger cranks and hubs. A 200+ pound adult doing muni or trials is going to need stronger equipment than a 100 pound kid riding the same trails and doing the same jumps and drops. There are some people who are just hard on equipment due to technique, the way they ride and what they’re willing to do. They need stronger equipment.
splined is just plain better all round… my experience-200lbs+square taper(cotterless) hub+12" drop=no more cotterless hub
One thing that I don’t think has been mentioned yet is that (I would assume) there is less force on the cranks of a trials bike than a unicycle for a given drop height. On a bike there are so many more angles to work with to help reduce the force of a drop, and I’d imagine that a good deal of the force that would be applied directly to the hub and cranks of a unicycle is instead being absorbed in the frame, handlebars, brakes, rear wheel, and body of the rider.
That’s all purely speculation though…
Andrew
after hearing all of this i think that i probably will move up to the splined, im getting a job that will pay nothing so i wont even have enough to buy the onza one after im done. Does anybody know a good place to get a 36 spoke splined for a reasonable price? If I half to ill buy it off of unicycle.com but id really rather not.
When it breaks.
Not necessarily the first one, but when your axles start breaking on a regular basis, you’ll know it’s time to move up instead of having to rebuild wheels all the time. I don’t like building wheels, or waiting while my uni is out of commission. I prefer being as maintenance-free as possible.
If your axles don’t break, or break very infrequently, you may be fine with a square taper hub. Those are fine for most unicycle, just not the ones we really jump on a lot.