I ride bike un-powered most of the time.....will geared hub-motor clutch wear out?

Motor is a BMS Q128C.

No. The clutch will last pretty much forever if you only pedal. They fail when you apply too much power or shock load with the motor.

We have data on 10s of thousands of miles on these style clutches, and I haven't seen one fail yet due to anything but gross overpowering of the motor itself.

When pedaling, the clutch inside is freewheeling, so its not going to wear much. Its power on when the teeth grab that the edges can get wear.


It would be like wearing out your regular freewheel, by coasting. I suppose its possible, but its going to take a long time.

The motor clutch uses three rollers....springs push against rollers to ensure they "bite" when rotation reverses relative to motor/case when power is applied. If rollers are spinning when coasting,wear on the three spring ends will occur.

pullin-gs said:

The motor clutch uses three rollers....springs push against rollers to ensure they "bite" when rotation reverses relative to motor/case when power is applied. If rollers are spinning when coasting,wear on the three spring ends will occur.

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Yes, true, but the forces are very low and there is lubrication so the wear is nearly zero.

Thanks for the notes everyone.
I'm not too concerned now about racking up my un-powered riding (613 miles since November!).
...
Maybe I will nail down a quicker process to swap out my stock wheel with my hub-motor wheel?
Hub motor bolts on....uses washers which seat into frame indents....and uses tabbed washers to keep wheel axle from spinning around (and destroying cables in process).
Stock wheel has quick release so very easy.