GeorgeBaby

I use the Gebla Rohbox (GEBLA) on my drop-bar touring bike and couldn't be happier.

BoltBreaker

Yes, the Internet is an essential tool for Rohloff information and maintenance! I also recently signed up at the Thorn cycling forums, their Rohloff section is the best I've found for direct owner experience and useful hacks. My hub is old enough, though just getting ridden now, that it had the threaded 16T cog, I made my own hub-locking tool to swap it out and am now riding a 17T splined cog, with 46T chainring (and a spare 42T chainring close at hand).

Around Berkeley, the local shops all know about Rohloff, but most of the cycles I see with them are fat bikes in the front windows of their shops. :-)

Tourist in MSN

I am mickeg on the Thorn forum. Thorn is a UK company, but there are a few from USA that own Thorns, I am one of them. And that Rohloff board attracts lots of non-Thorn users. If you recently saw a photo on that forum with the giant adjustable wrench and big chain whip, with a canoe behind it, that is my Grumman canoe.

I am not sure why but Thorn always sells bikes with a 17T Rohloff sprocket, but the hubs come from the factory with 16T, which is what I have.

Around home I use a 44T chainring, but touring or mountain biking I use a 36T chainring. And add or remove 4 links with a second quick link.

BoltBreaker

Yes, the East Bay is a kind of black hole for stolen bicycles. Here, they seem to end up either at Karim's or the Ashby Flea Market, but I've managed to keep all of mine, so far. The only bike I ride and lock is my Rivendell QuickBeam, and that's just while shopping. The Rohloff bike will likely never get locked to a post or fence, it will either be under my ass on a ride or secured in the garage (or motel room). Still, life is filled with risks, and I know there are opportunists everywhere.

Tourist in MSN

In my community nobody knows what a Rohloff bike is. I have had several people ask where the battery is for my e-bike. They think it is a motor in the hub. I do not use a very good lock for that bike even though I have a lot more invested in that bike than in my titanium bike. But the titanium bike looks expensive, so that lock cost over $100.

GamblerGORD53

My Rohloff and 2 SA drum brake IGHs, all have the shifter in the best possible place, on the TT near the front. ZERO chance of any kind of damage. I can shift with either hand. The cables have no flopping bits. I just cut a 7/8" tube and filed/ welded it to a piece of cut 1 1/8" frame tube. One hose clamp with some tape and rubber padding.
I just rode it 128.6 hilly miles, in 14.3 hours clock time. Getting quieter all the time now, 17,777 miles now. I also made a CF chain case. I really like mine with the EX box and nutted axles. Easy to clean. It's 44/ 16T now. Was 48T on the first tour and 46T on the second.

ThermionicScott 

With how popular e-bikes are getting, you may need to start locking up the Rohloff bike a little better, just in case a thief thinks it's an e-bike!

Rick

People look at fat me, the large hub and the battery for my daylight visibility light on my seat post and believe it is an ebike.

Tourist in MSN I saw the closeup of your rear wheel and was wondering about how much oil seepage is normal before the Rohloff would need an overhaul and new seals. My Rohloff looks similar to yours after eight months since the oil change. I read some where that it is impossible to loose enough oil to do damage to the hub between oil changes, unless you do damage to it like a cracked hub shell.

Tourist in MSN

I am going largely by memory here, but Thorn has sold a lot of Rohloff hubs and has discussed a lot of details with Rohloff. And Thorn has said that when you first fill up a new Rohloff, you put in 25ml. When time for the first oil change, about 8ml will remain in the hub adhering to to all the internals. And when you use the cleaning oil, that also adheres to the internals.

So, when you change the oil, if you put in all 25ml, eventually some of that leaks out of the seals, but that 8ml is still providing lubrication so don't worry about it. And Thorn suggests putting in 15ml instead of all 25ml so you get less leakage.

Thorn has also in some of their documentation suggested adding only 8ml in an oil change, but I have only seen that once and I do not recall where. Their video I think cites 15ml, so that is what I do.

The cleaning oil, I just use 15ml of that too. Several years ago I bought the 250ml bottles of both oils, so I have enough oil to last for a while. I ride several different bikes, so I never put enough miles on the Rohloff in one year to require more than one oil change annually.

If my EX box looks too dirty, I just use a paper towel to wipe the dirt and excess oil off. And I do not worry about lack of oil in the hub.

ADDENDUM:

I just looked at the photo of your bike, you have a disc brake on the rear. Since you really want to make sure you do not contaminate your disc pads with oil, you should probably wipe off any excess oil much more frequently than I do, as I do not need to worry about disc pads getting contaminated.

skookum

I'm in the middle of a Rohloff oil change right now, bike is in the garage with the cleaning oil draining. I fill the hub with 15ml of oil, but I have never tried to use only 15ml of cleaning oil.

Rick

I cleaned the area with a tooth brush and dish detergent since my last post. The brake pads that Paul uses on the Klamper are oil resistant so on worries on contamination. I am know going to pull the couplers apart and clean and grease them with Teflon grease. I also found a road bike tube to cut up for the dust covers like you do. Thanks for the info.

Rick

When I changed my oil in January I put in less than the 25 ml. I Believe Cycle Monkey says 18 ml and Thorn says 15 ml so I put in around 17 ml. There has been no ill effect meaning everything works the same and no strange or loud noises coming from the Rohloff.

Tourist in MSN

By the time it is due for another oil change it will be down to the 8ml that adhere to the internals.

I used a mountain bike tube, exact size I do not know. I think the sleeves are about 1 inch long. Two photos attached.





My downtube is slightly larger diameter than the top tube, I do not recall if I used the same size sleeves or not on both tubes.

djb

boy, only 25ml !
two tablespoons ish

I'm just really surprised that its so little, really surprised. I would have thought 250 or something, but I'm just coming from thinking of motorcycle oil capacities that did engine lubing, cooling, transmission and clutch lubing also.(wet clutches)

I also worked in photography for many years, so 25ml of something sure isnt very much. I mixed and calculated developers and everything for decades, so am used to using various graduated cylinders etc.

Tourist in MSN

Some people refer to it as an oil bath, but it is more of a rinse, not an oil bath.

Your motorcycles had more energy available from the engine to rotate the components against friction from the seals than on the Rohloff hub where there is not a great amount of excess power to fight seal friction, so the seals are rather leaky. (The seals however are more leaky on my vintage Triumph motorcycles,)

You do not pour the oil in, you use a syringe to inject it, the oil fill hole is plugged with an M5 screw.

Think of the most expensive cooking oil that a chef might use for an expensive dish, Rohloff oil probably costs more on a volume basis.

I bought the 250 ml bottles from Germany. Even with the shipping cost it was much cheaper than 25ml bottles each year in USA.
https://www.bike24.com/p2406748.html

djb

that explains it, I thought all the internals were immersed in oil, so why 25ml didn't make sense.
You could see how every so often, doing the "clean" or whatever with a different liquid could be good to remove any particles or buildup of stuff.
Didn't one of you mention this?
I've always read of how rohlofs quieten down after a certain number of kilometres, so it would stand to reason that there are teeny amounts of worn off material in there.

Tourist in MSN

OIl change involves adding 25ml of Rohloff cleaning oil, running the hub some (I do about a 2 km ride), then let it drain for at least 15 min. Then add the 25ml of new lube oil. Thorn recommends 15ml of new oil, and since you buy the same amount of cleaning oil as lube oil, I use 15ml for both.

Hub is quieter with more distance, but the hub noise is only noticeable in gears 1-7, gear 7 is the loudest. There are three sets of planetary gears and when you are in gears 1-7, the third planetary gear system is used, that is not unlike using low range on a Jeep or 4X4 pickup truck.



I noticed on my Canadian Maritimes trip where I added the oil just before I started riding from Halifax, that the first several days the hub was quite quiet, but got steadily noisier for the first couple weeks. I am guessing that it took a couple weeks for the excess oil to have leaked out and once it was out, the noise returned. But it was still much quieter than when the hub was new.

I do not know if that graphic is an actual physical object that was photographed or an computer drawn rendition, but I think I see a bit of rust on part of one of the planetary systems, so I am inclined to think it is a photo.

djb

I'd be inclined to say photo also. I've done a certain amount of product photography, including jewelry and metallic and shiny surfaced objects, so the reflections etc look natural to my eye, although one never knows with cgi. I would say though that the tiny details of imperfections and discolouration on some splines seem to me to be a real object--I can't imagine that if this was cgi and for illustrative purposes, that joe blow graphis person would purposely put in wear marks etc.
Neat to see the innards.

Rick

I call the noise a new Rohloff hub makes in 7th gear the turbo squirrel cage. Mine has quieted down and I can't hear it in traffic anymore or am I going deaf. There are three hills on my exercise route that I end up in 1st gear. The first few times I was at 3.8mph at around 90rpm. This morning I made it up them at 4.2mph. When this happens my breathing is louder than the traffic. I only saw one Rohloff equipped bicycle in person prior to my purchasing one. I read about the hub for the first time on the web in Florida at a public library. When I went back to the library to read more about the Rohloff, the library had a watchdog program installed. I made a query about the Rohloff hub and the system thought that I was trying to access an anarchist web site and I had to get a librarian to reset the system so I could continue using the computer. I found a back door article by Sheldon Brown on the Rohloff hub.

fooferdoggie 

then you got the e bike version all electronic shifting.

Rick

I have seen the video and looked at cargo ebikes with the electronic shift Rohloff. The cargo bike is what I need but they have to low of a weight limit. You can only have the electronic shifting with the Bosch motor. I am going to find an older non wimpafied Yuba Mundo and put a Schlumpf Mountain drive on it. I also intend to put the GMac motor kit on it. A geared motor with regen braking.

veganbikes

My e-bike has a Rohloff E-14 is the absolute best. Such a nice easy shift and the auto down shift when you stop is so great. Plus it has got me riding to and from work nearly daily and doing more errands via bike.

Tourist in MSN

I am going to stay non-electric. But it sounds to me like you are using an e-bike were it is best used, for commuting. In my community the e-bikes are clogging up the multi-use paths and bike paths by people pretending that they are getting exercise when they coast up hills, you rarely see an e-bike on the street.

Someone on this forum has two Surly Trolls, one with Rohloff for commuting and one derailleur with S&S couplers for touring. I find that an interesting mix. If I was commuting I would be using derailleur, but perhaps my mix of hills and flat segments to where I used to work before retirement is quite different than his. Although the thieves in my community do not know what a Rohloff is, I would not commute on anything expensive, as where I used to work was a high bike theft area.

Rick

I rarely ride on an mup or other types of bike paths. They are a source of irritation for me. In the early 80s I lived in a student town and there were bike lanes on city streets and divided and separated bike and pedestrian path on the university property. Ebikes weren't around then but that didn't stop some people on bicycles from injuring and sometimes killing others by riding dangerously into pedestrians and other bicyclists. The cargo ebike I intend to build up is for shopping. Two 80liter load bags and a basket on front will allow allot of groceries to be hauled.

veganbikes

It is a great commuter, and has got me riding a whole lot more. I can't coast up any hills, I certainly can decide to work a little less but no throttles nothing like a moped or motorcycle. I dislike MUPs in general in fact I generally don't care for most humans around me...LOLOLOL