My Honest Opinion On The Classified Hub

First time riding the new hub made by classified. Thanks to Dov and Amy from Parcours for showing me their local roads.

The following companies (that you'll see in my content) support me either financially or with free stuff, so huge thanks to these guys for helping the channel thrive:
Attacus Cycling,
SCOTT,
MET Helmets,
Shimano,
fidlock,
Hutchinson Tyres
Sungod
Tailfin
GT85
Garmin
Parcours Wheels

#cycling #bikes #bicycle

[_Zane__]

The switch for the gear should honestly be a rocker type, then you can tell just by feeling what part is sticking out what gear you're in

[davidv]

Justin may have liked that. Bigger ring for the flats but able to drop down for the hills.

[andrewmcalister]

7:40 I had the same thought in mind - a bigger difference in ratio could allow small jumps between gears AND a large range, by eliminating some of the overlap. I agree it is the right move of Classified to start with what people are familiar with.

[drusek]

I ride the Classified Hub on Zipp 353s on my Wilier road bike and am very happy with it!
It's physically wired into the left DI2 shifter which eliminates the need for the sprint button that Classified provides. It was a little effort to perform the wiring but not terribly difficult. Rather than the toggling on or off that the sprint shifter provides, the DI2 integration allows one shifter button to put the hub in 1:1 mode (1) and the other shifter to put the hub into reduced (2) mode. That simplifies matters, but since the Hub integrates into my Karoo head unit I have a field on my screen which displays a 1 or 2 to indicate the state of the Hub mechanism. I installed a k-edge chain keeper on my 52t chainring to keep things in place. It's great technology, but better integration with Shimano or SRAM would be a real plus.

[orlandopiper]

Could just keep the 2x and use this for mega range. Also I'm not sold on the chainline argument. I'd have thought you're more likely to have a more efficient chainline if you use 2x sensibly (ie not cross chaining) rather than one ring for all the cogs

[invisiblescout]

Fun fact, cross-chaining is not as inneficient as it's touted to be. In fact, big-big cross-chained is more efficient than equivalent small rings ratio, because of the shallower bends the chain has to make.

[capt_darling]

Now that I have finished watching the Cyclocross... This is bloody brilliant! I hope that the big manufacturers decide to pay a licence fee (or something similar) to use/replicate this....

[DPbike]

Francis i think you’re spot on with the much lower ratio!
With full electronic sequential shifting you would then just need for one lever/button for upshift and the other for downshift. If each was configured for one ‘blip’ one gear, and longer pressure, shift till released, how cool would that be.

[UK-Cycling]

More of these product reviews please Francis. A top video. Very interesting product now with some quality wheels. Best regards Martin

[alethearobinson]

Interesting concept. I can see this mostly on gravel and mountain bikes. Turning a one by into a two by without a front derailleur to get ripped off. On the steep logging roads here in Oregon, it is easy to run out of gears, this would help a lot.
The price will come down if this gets popular.
Nice review, thanks.

[ilanpi]

In my opinion, the issue with this system is that you'll need to get a number of such hubs in order to use different wheels. For example, on a gravel bike that you also use as a road bike. Or else, if you notice that you have a broken spoke just before your ride. This was my major criticism of the PowerTap rear wheel power meter.

[MGRSD]

Very cool piece of tech. I immediately started fantasizing about a 3T Strada, Parcours Chrono + Classified hub, and Sram Red eTap AXS 1X groupset. Epic.

[fredhamlin]

It would be great if it actually had a lower difference ~12% between high and low. Then you could run a 11-40 and take the big jumps between gears and each one would have an intermediate 'classified' gear and because it shifts so instantly it doesn't matter unlike if you were shifting your front ring every gear shift. It gives the equivalent of a true 24 speed setup where there are no repeated gears and almost even spacing and you don't have to shift down the whole cassette when you shift from high to low ratio.

[allanfraser]

Have a pair of classifieds wheels on my gravel bike and the were flawless all summer. There is one not talked about issue. Serviceability, on a standard set of hubs cartridge bearings can be replaced easily. When the non standard sized bearings need replaced in this hub, it needs to back to classified or the warranty is lost. In short the planetary gears are solid but cartridge bearings are cartridge bearings and will need replaced at some point. If that makes sense.

[DoNuT_]

It's cool tech and good to see that they are making first steps into the market, having wheel partners (including Mavic) is a good start. Nothing wrong with re-thinking something archaic as a front derailleur but I think, it'll stay a nichè product, just because it is expensive and most likely be paired with expensive components such as electronic groupsets and premium wheels in most builds.

[stephenturkLA]

Back in the late 1990s I had a Bike Friday travel bike with a Sachs/SRAM 3x7 DualDrive system. That is, 3-speed internal hub combined with 7-speed cassette. I think Sturmey-Archer still makes a 3-speed hub with a freehub that will take 10-speed (and some 11-speed) cassettes. The big innovation here seems to be that Classified has added electronic shifting. And maybe made the hub lighter by limiting it to 2-speed.

[Hugo-umnh]

the business plan is to get bought by sram

[AntoineThisdale]

Been waiting on this for a while. Still crazy money but the tech is very interesting. Like as EV cars comes in, the instant torque and no more "gear shifting" requirement is "a new thing". Very cool. This would be awesome on a MTB as well; lots of up/down shifting in those conditions.

[Jamie-pbgi]

A good point about it being 0.7 and 1 surely there will be a bunch of equivalent gear ratios in there just like you get with a normal 2 by. I guess it depends on the cassette used but a bigger jump in ratios would prevent some of the overlap. Would be a bit odd though going from the smallest cog in the "little ring" and having to sweep back to the biggest cog in the "big ring".

[cyclingsalmon]

I like how they compare their "perfect chain line" only to crossed chain on 2x systems, but they forget to mention that if you use your 2x properly chain line is much better than with 1x.
I'm a big fan of 1x myself, but this kind of data presenting is borderline with lying.