Freewheel question

[Jae]

Looking at hub motors for my Mongoose Malus fat bike There's something i am unsure of.Am i better off buying a a motor with Cassette or thread on freewheel?

 

[Jae]

I think i found the answer,i can do either but cassette is better option.

 

[SimonNZ]

I suspect there’s not much difference when it comes to day to day riding but a cassette is probably easier to remove and there are probably more gearing options & brands available for cassettes.

 

[Chalo]

Cassettes are better if you'll be pedaling enough to wear things out periodically. They also make your hub motor more fragile, with weaker bearings and less available replacement parts.

I pedal pretty much constantly, but I rarely wear anything out in the chain drive of my hub motor bikes. So I'd go for the more robust and reliable freewheel option if I had the choice.

 

[neptronix]

I'd pick a cassette because i can get 11t low gearing without having to buy a garbage 11t DNP freewheel to get it.
You also have a ton more gearing options with a cassette.

 

[SimonNZ]

Out of interest - how so “more fragile” …

 

[E-HP]

If you go with a cassette then you should make sure that there are parts to rebuild the free hub. I’ve had the pawls crap out twice on my freewheel but it was easy to just replace the freewheel and not mess with rebuilding and replacing parts. It would suck if you had to replace the whole motor if parts aren’t available.

 

[docw009]

I put DNP freewheels on two bikes in 2017, and both failed around 3000 miles. Pawls slipping, Replaced with more DNP's. Those have accumulated about 3000 and 2200 more miles since. so perhaps I'll see a third one go bad this year. Or maybe quality has gotten better.