I would say it probably would be easier to ride and possibly easier to learn with a light drag brake. I notice the friction difference between concrete, asphalt, and dirt and more friction makes it a little easier to balance (similar to a regular unicycle).
You lose leverage, however. I’d be curious to see what the difference would be if someone rode a mechanical bull the normal way and then rode one with something like a pole coming out of it so you could hold on at chest height.
The good news is hopping came fairly easily. The bad news is my 15mm axle hub didn’t last a single session before bending in two dimensions.
@Ben Have you, your son, or Nathan tried hopping on the Nimbus hub? The smaller width may make it inherently stronger but I wonder if the axle is 15 or 17mm in diameter.
Have you ever tried riding a wheelie downhill? Try it, let me know how that goes for ya 
Okay, so I can now consistently ride up the street, which is comprised of ~ 200" of slight uphill and another 200’ of flat. I have no problem managing the uphill, but when I get to the flats I find it very hard to control my speed, which leads to going to fast, which leads to the uni going faster than I can peddle, which leads to me walking back to my house.
I have learned to use the brake to control my speed, but I must pedal against the brake to prevent any sudden coasting moments which lead to me walking back to my house. This works well, but it can be a bit frenetic!
One of the things I am realizing is that bicyclists coast incrementally during part of their rotation, they just don’t realize it; this is what makes unicycling so “edgy” for a new rider. The problem with having incremental coasting when pedaling a unicycle is that during that “increment” the uni will continue to move, which causes a change in balance, which leads to me walking back to my house.
The hardest move I am working on is making a 180 degree “carrved” turn so that I can ride back to my house, but so far it has led to me walking back to my house.
I have done some downhill while pedaling against the brake, this is very scary, and often leads to me jumping off and walking back to my house.
A bigger wheel might be better, but I just don’t know yet. I am going to install a longer seat post as I think being “squat” while riding is making it harder to make turns, which leads to…
me walking back to my house 
I have no idea on the spindle diameter, it’s a pretty durable hub, chromoly spindle, I doubt I could bend it with hopping. I can hop, simply by keeping my weight on the leading pedal, I often hop to get my balance when starting up the street.
Waalrus, do you make hopping turns to change directions or a mix of hopping and “carved/ridden” turns?
Are you building a new wheel now? I’d definitely go for a 26", the 24" is okay but could be bigger. I think a 26" would be a nice size for cruising, maybe a 29" but I’d want to try one before building one.
I may sell this wheel and build another one slightly bigger, but I’d need a 26" frame and a donor wheel…
Anyone ready to join the freewheel parade?
Awesome progress!
I don’t hop for turns and have put a halt on hopping temporarily until I get a stronger hub. I do carved/ridden turns, usually brake assisted. I do figure 8’s in my driveway in about the width of two cars or so. I also practice doing 180 turns on an incline without braking, turning the wheel as I come to a stop. I don’t hop for that, either, but that was my original impetus for learning hopping. I get a decent 180 every once in a while but it’s pretty rare that I get the turn and then roll back down the incline (without pedaling). I’m practicing these so I can try out riding in a skatepark.
In both turns and going downhill I lock my legs somewhere between 5/11 and 6/12 o’clock position. I’ve found I need a fairly low seat to do this, lower than I would naturally have it otherwise. When I ride a higher seat I lose the leverage I need to balance going at higher speeds downhill.
I got my hub and measured it at 17mm which is great news although now I have some extra 15mm diameter bearings I probably won’t use. I probably bent my other axle when I was practicing 6/12 o’clock hopping. I figured I’d need to be able to do this to drop in on a ramp.
Yes, I’m working with a bike shop to build the wheel and should be talking parts with them this afternoon. I want to go with a wide 26" bike rim (Halo SAS) and your mechanical disc brake (TRP Spyre). One of my favorite things to do is ride down paved hills so I’m planning to put a Halo Twin Rail tire on it. The bigger wheel won’t necessarily be faster but it will make riding back up shorter. I’m curious how the bigger wheel will change various properties. For instance, when I’m riding downhill there seems a speed that I can hit where balancing seems almost unnecessary (I’d estimate 8-9mph). Will this change with the wheel size? Will I be able to hit this speed on flat ground with a larger wheel?
I would definitely rather let someone else have a chance to experience freewheeling first hand, both to augment the movement but also to spread the joy around. However, if you do end up selling and you don’t get any takers I’d be interested. I still don’t know what the optimal skatepark freewheel size should be.
When looking for my new big wheel uni I ran across this little gem. I said to myself this is exacty what Waaalrus needs. A 48" freewheel. :D:D
I’d give it a try, but if I had my druthers I’d choose a smaller, geared freewheel. 
Why won’t a MTB lever work? I was checking out road vs. BMX vs. MTB levers yesterday and didn’t understand why one would be better over the other. The BMX and MTB seemed about the same angle wise but the MTB one had more features (i.e., ability to adjust the preset angle). The tip was bent more at the end but my KH Star Fighter still seemed to fit OK. The road one had a completely different angle and was much longer.
The BMX lever and MTB lever have a different ratio of cable pull, so the MTB lever will pull more cable in the same angle of lever throw, making the brake overly sensitive.
You can try it, “they” could be wrong, but I was told this by the TRP vendor shop guys…
I am going to get another set of TRP for the freewheel uni.
So Waalrus, do you simultaneously glide the brake and pedal when riding flats, “pushing” into the brake to prevent freewheeling?
Can you see any reason why a bigger wheel wouldn’t work?
I’m thinking of building a 29er to have more control over my “rolling speed”.
Also, I still have not mastered the coasting, any thoughts?
Thanks for the info! I think I’ll go ahead and try the MTB one and if it’s too sensitive I can switch it out.
The only time I brake and pedal simultaneously is when the terrain is very bumpy or rocky or when I’m practicing to ride when it’s bumpy or rocky. I found this very difficult at first because I quickly would get out of control (I’m not very coordinated). With practice I can go a lot longer with more control.
I see three issues with a larger wheel: (1) mounting, (2) falling, and (3) leverage.
At my height (5’8") I would have to hop up onto a 29" wheel to mount it. I think I could actually do this with a little practice but it would be more difficult than a smaller wheel.
There are many ways to UPD from the freewheel (as you are probably intimately familiar with). Quite often it’s simply going from pedal to ground suddenly. On the 20" wheel I often feel the ground comes too quickly and a little more space might be better. But the greater the distance the harder the impact. The 29" may be well within the range of acceptability but I’ll have a better idea when I ride the 26" and can interpolate.
This is the issue that’s most unknown. I get leverage by locking my legs. I wonder if riding a larger wheel will lessen this leverage because there’s a greater distance from the axle to the ground. It may be that this isn’t true or it’s not significant in the wheel sizes that are under consideration.
Based on the description of your riding I think you would benefit from adding more coasting into the mix. Here’s my suggestion. On a flat or slightly uphill paved road or sidewalk stand with one foot on the pedal and the saddle underneath you. In this position you’re basically standing on one leg and pulling the pedal back towards your body (it’s at 6 o’clock). Push from as low as you can with your chest up (not forward), slightly arched back, and see if you can coast with just one foot on the pedals. If you can regularly get a few feet of this go ahead and try to get your other foot on the pedal. Once you can get both feet on you can try pedaling a single revolution. Single revolution - coast - single revolution. Then you can work on getting more pedaling revolutions in. I have some video I can share if that would help. Make sure to engage your core muscles and have your chest up with a slightly arched back.
Considering your practice space another approach might be to try locking your feet at 6/12 o’clock after a run of uphill pedaling. You might think something like three revolutions and then lock. Naturally this will result in a lot of UPDs but over time you might get to a point of coasting for a few feet.
You might also practice brake coasting downhill. Start at the top and pedal a little to get some speed and then lock your legs and use the brake to control your speed on the way down.
My riding style is to pedal up to speed then bleed off some of that speed with the brake or road/ground friction and then repeating. My ultimate goal is to use the brake as little as possible.
I did a 6-7 mile off road ride on my freewheel unicycle over the weekend (the sand drifts kicked my butt!) but otherwise have been trying to keep it off the trails. I’ve most been practicing 180 turns and trying to go faster down hills. Here are a couple related videos I shot today. Once I get my 26" (in the next week or so) I’m hoping to increase my off road skills.
Just a heads up, the Nimbus drift trike hubs are now available at UDC US.
I got mine, now it’s your turn. You should build up that freewheeling 36er for big mountain descents 
I considered getting a 36" freewheel built but am waiting to see what happens with this 3.8x drift trike hub. With that gearing a 24" or 26" would probably as big as you want to go.
I still like the idea of a freewheel 36er, but I’d like to try one first.
On the other hand, my 29er at the moment, is gathering dust…
One issue with the 36" freewheel for shorter people like me would be mounting. A static mount may be difficult and it’s frustrating to practice a running mount because at this point I have a slight unpredictable drift which often causes the cranks to turn a little when the wheel moves forward. I wonder if this is caused by some gunk buildup from mountain unicycling. It happened to both of my other freewheels. An alternative mount might be a pole vault start where you start with one foot on the crank, start going with the other foot skateboard-style, then hop on, possibly using the assistance of the brake. Tall people won’t have this problem and since I run a lower seat on freewheel unicycles it may not be a big deal for me either. I can do a static mount on my big wheel, but there’s some lateral motion to it.
If you had a freewheeling hub and a brake, then you could use the brake to create a broadly similar effect to mounting a conventional fixed wheel uni.
If I lock the wheel up on any of my unis, I can mount the uni by letting it pivot underneath me (make sense?), so I believe that it could be done with some practice.
Honestly, I reeeeeaaaaalllly still want a 36er free wheel. The hubs aren’t crazy expensive, but too narrow for my frame, so I’d need new spokes presumably. I also wouldn’t want to put it in and find out it’s as hard as everyone is saying it is, then have to relace my wheel again.
I saw a freewheel hub for sale somewhere that looked like it might work in nimbus 36er frame, and maybe you’d even be able to reuse the spokes.
If you build a 36’er free wheel and ride it I will personally come to your house and give you a cookie.
That’s quite a commute…