If you’re going on a long bike tour through less developed parts of the world, you naturally want the parts on your bike to last as long as possible.
With so many choices on the market, however, it can be hard to find the parts that are right for you. Occasionally we receive emails asking for our advice and experience with parts over long distances.
The latest question we received focused on which hubs to use for an extended bike tour through Africa:
A friend and I are planning a cycle trip through Africa, to some pretty remote places. I’m using Stephen Lord’s Adventure Cycle-Touring Handbook and the experience of me and my mates to makes calls on components for our bikes. The one thing I can’t settle on is which hubs to use. The mountain bike guys in our community say Hope or Chris King hubs are the way to go but they are significantly more expensive than Deore XTs or SLX or even XTR. I’ve never had hub problems, but I have some mates who’ve said their Shimano Hubs were a bit troublesome after events like the Cape Epic race. For an 8 month, 10,000km tour, what would you recommend? -Alex