Originally Posted by
Charles Wahl
What?! Fat Tire shows up to serve ale, and it's in cans? In Portlandia? What the hell is the world coming to?
I like Mr King's shirt, and his other products like headsets are OK, but his attention-seeking noisesome freehub bodies are, in my opinion, one of the banes of cycling existence (right up there with wannabee "sponsored" lycra).
Those noisy freehubs - King gave a few prototypes to users to put through the paces. Focus was on getting them to work. Sound was an issue to address at the next stage. (Why do all the additional machining for quiet when it's 50-50 you're going to be machining more of the same parts from scratch for Mark II.) But the testers raved about the sound!
I fully agree - freehubs should be silent or very close. But resisting what the public insists on isn't being money making smart. So I can only blame Chris King so much. (Says he who used to grease his Winner FWs so no one could hear that he wasn't working in a race. Edit: And will never consider a King hub until that sound is gone.)