March 21, 2023
The Pro 4 hub was for many years the benchmark hub in terms of performance, reliability and versatility. We've used them on our own bikes, we offer them on our top-of-the-range Works builds and they've even found their way onto limited edition dirt jump bikes. But if there was one small gripe, it was that the engagement wasn't quite as fast as some of the latest alternatives.
Hope have addressed that in their 5th generation hub and delivered a bunch of other performance and reliability improvements that might just make Hope Pro 5 hubs the one. They're now available on our updated 2023 Edit Works and 2023 Filter Works bikes, as well as our Hand Built Trail wheelset and Hand Built Enduro wheelset (both with 20% off RRP right now).
The Pro 4 was in our view the most reliable hub out there. Failure rate was near non-existent, bearing life was excellent and serviceability was top-notch. But the 4-pawl / 44-tooth mechanism meant only 44 points of engagement; in other words that's 8° of rotation before the hub responds to your input.
The new hub has a 6-pawl / 54 tooth mechanism with the pawls are offset into two sets of three, which means 108 points of engagement. That's 3.33° of rotation. A massive improvement that you can both hear and feel on-trail.
Hope a renowned for the quality of their product but dare we say they might sometimes overengineer things. The Pro 4 was a very robust bit of kit but some felt like there was a bit too much drag, which they've addressed in the new design. In spite of the much faster pickup, there's less drag in the Pro 5.
Sealing isn't something we've ever considered to be an issue with Hope hubs before (I'm still running a set of Pro 2 Evo hubs on an older bike), but they've found some improvements anyway. You can never have too much reliability, after all. Less time (and money) spent on servicing is more time riding.
Lastly, there are some improvements to the bearings to really lock in that extra durability. As before, they're cartridge bearings supplied by INA Germany with labyrinth type seals.
Ed is the owner of Airdrop Bikes. A former web and graphic designer, he sacked off his job one day and decided to start up a bike brand.
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July 09, 2025
Rockshox recently released the Pike DJ to the new Electric Red colour. We like to make sure that we keep our bikes up to date, so we took the opportunity to give the Fade Core a bit of a refresh.
June 26, 2025
June 06, 2025
We've partnered up with True North Cycle Hub to give you the chance to demo an Edit MX in Wharncliffe Woods on Saturday 14th June, 2025.
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