Thorn Cycles Forum
Community => Rohloff Internal Hub Gears => Topic started by: Danneaux on May 27, 2023, 06:13:20 PM
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Rohloff-related Facebook groups are reporting the sad passing of Bernhard Rohloff, "father" of our beloved Speedhubs.
His family and "family" of employees must all be gutted and the magnitude of his loss will ripple through the entire industry.
Condolences to his loved ones and a final thanks to him for providing such joy to those of us who have used and enjoyed his inventions.
Godspeed, Bernie.
Best, Dan.
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Hear hear.
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I just woke up here in Thailand to this sad news .
Thoughts añd love to his family
Matt
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A great product from a great man.
Condolences to his loved ones.
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Rohloff was a great engineer. He made the lives of cyclists so much more convenient.
Now let us praise famous men. -- Ecclesiastes
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Dan, thanks for the notice.
Pasted from Wikipedia:
The Rohloff Speedhub is an epicyclic internal hub gear for bicycles, developed and patented by Rohloff AG. It has been manufactured and marketed by that company since 1998.
So, that means sometime this year there should be a 25th anniversary.
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Pasted from Wikipedia:
The Rohloff Speedhub is an epicyclic internal hub gear for bicycles, developed and patented by Rohloff AG. It has been manufactured and marketed by that company since 1998.
So, that means sometime this year there should be a 25th anniversary.
Rohloff says that the hub was launched in 1997 https://www.rohloff.de/en/company/rohloff-ag so it seems we missed the 25th anniversary party but Herr Rohloff didn't. Anyway, he was remarkably ingenious in being able to both design and build that amazing gearbox.
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A brief wikipedia entry (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernhard_Rohloff) gives February 1950 as the late Mr Rohloff's birthdate, so he made it to 73. Which sadly is not all that far.
Amazing contribution to cyclists. And I think I read somewhere that he never advertised the hub - talk about product-driven marketing. :D
Also an amazing example of too good to be true - as in, it can't be as good as they say, so what they say must be false.
The hubs, as we know, are extremely heavy, rob a lot of energy, produce a lot of drag that leaves you watching helplessly as your mates disappear on descents, and are almost impossible to get parts for or repair when they break down on tour.
I know a keen gravel rider from the generation after mine who wouldn't have a Rohloff because of the high risk of being stranded if something went wrong.
Yet the inventor and manufacturer persevered, found fans in Andy Blance and others, and operated a successful family-owned company. Must have been a remarkable character. I wonder what the future holds for his firm.
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Hi Moronic
Funny you should ask about the future of the Rohloff firm.
I have no idea, however.....
A few days ago I met my first touring cyclist here in Thailand.
Phil from Switzerland.
We were headed in opposite directions so just had half an hour to chat about what lay ahead for each of us.
He was around 40 I think. And had cycled that long route from top to bottom of the Americas.
Pan something or other.
As well as lots of Asian countries.
Riding a Surly something.
I pointed out my Rohloff and mentioned the reliability and countries it's taken me to
He knew the Thorn brand as well and Rohloff.
He then told me he was using a Rohloff on his Pan American tour and when he arrived in Canada had a problem with it.
Sorry, he didn't elaborate.
However.......
He said he'd phoned the company to complain about the lack of part availability in Canada and.....
spoke to Miss Rohloff.
He indicated that she was in charge.
Long story, sorry. But perhaps the company really is a family business and will carry on owner by family members.
I think he was using the hub on a recumbent.
Nice guy. Didn't rant and rave about it. More observed that their customer service isn't world wide, as he was lead to believe.
Anyway, I thought I'd mention it.
Cheers from Surat Thani, Southern Thailand at 30°+.
Matt
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The hubs, as we know, are extremely heavy, rob a lot of energy, produce a lot of drag that leaves you watching helplessly as your mates disappear on descents, and are almost impossible to get parts for or repair when they break down on tour.
I know a keen gravel rider from the generation after mine who wouldn't have a Rohloff because of the high risk of being stranded if something went wrong.
Rohloff’s warranty service is legendary, and that is why their hubs have historically been seen as good bets for e.g. Trans-African tours. Even if replacement parts aren’t right at hand in the very unlikely event of failure, they had you covered with DHL regardless of how remote the country was.
As for “rob a lot of energy, produce a lot of drag”, this is well documented as a small number and is unlikely to be a factor outside of lycra-clad speed-demon scenes. What stops Rohloff riders from being able to keep up on downhills, is that Rohloff riders tend to install – because they can – much lower gearing that their friends on derailleur setups.
I admit feeling some trepidation about the future of Rohloff AG when Pinion has stolen their marketing thunder with their gearbox that sits in the bike’s center. When I rode the Baja Divide last season, I got a few comments along the lines of “You still have a Rohloff? Everyone’s riding Pinions now.”
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... their customer service isn't world wide, as he was lead to believe.
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When I bought my Rohloff, I had no expectations for great warranty service. I am in USA where Rohloff hubs are extremely rare. I have never seen another Rohloff in my community other than my own, so I know with certainty that I would not get any bike shop support. There is a former Rohloff employee in my community that I have talked to, but I do not know which shop he works for now.
In my research before I bought the Nomad Mk II in 2013, I found the most common complaint was flange cracks. When they came out with the flange support rings, I added them to my hub.
And the second most common comment was that they had to send the hub back for adjusting shim thickness. The shim comments suggested that if work was going to be needed, it likely was in the first few thousand miles of hub usage. I built up my Nomad Mk II shortly before I rode the GAP and C&O (a popular touring route in USA) and decided to bring my Sherpa (derailleur bike) instead of my Nomad because I wanted my Nomad to get more wear before I had to rely on it for a tour away from home.
My point, I was willing to take the risk. I have seen lots of derailleur drive train problems that could not easily be fixed too.
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I admit feeling some trepidation about the future of Rohloff AG when Pinion has stolen their marketing thunder with their gearbox that sits in the bike’s center. When I rode the Baja Divide last season, I got a few comments along the lines of “You still have a Rohloff? Everyone’s riding Pinions now.”
I think that the Pinion advantage of less unsprung weight for the rear on a suspension bike makes the Pinion a much better option for a full suspension mountain bike.
But for touring, I would prefer Rohloff over Pinion. For one thing, I prefer a chain over a belt because I use a smaller chainring for lower gear range when I go on a tour than I do for riding near home. It is easy to remove or add a few links when I change chainrings.
It is my understanding that Pinion has more drag than a Rohloff.
Belt on a Rohloff has more drag than a chain.
And, it is my understanding that the drag on a Rohloff bike is reduced quite a bit if you have an eccentric bottom bracket for chain adjustment, the spring loaded jockey wheel(s) of a chain tensioner add drag that you do not have with an eccentric. My Nomad Mk II does not have the jockey wheel drag.
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But for touring, I would prefer Rohloff over Pinion. For one thing, I prefer a chain over a belt because I use a smaller chainring for lower gear range when I go on a tour than I do for riding near home. It is easy to remove or add a few links when I change chainrings.
You can run a chain on a Pinion. They are not belt-only drivetrains.
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Kindernay is the direct challenger to Rohloff and has some useful improvements such as the gearbox being easily removable from the shell. Pinion needs a bike to be designed around the gearbox and can't be retro-fitted.
I recall that a derailleur drivetrain in excellent condition can be more efficient than the Rohloff hub which, in turn, is more efficient than a worn and mucky derailleur drivetrain.
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Amazing contribution to cyclists.
I'm with you there, Ian: Herr Rohloff's design and product has greatly improved my Life On Two Wheels.
As for the Speedhub's limitations, it's horses for courses, I guess: The first really good bike I bought was a nice ti-framed light touring Eclipse, purchased in 2002/03. My frustration with the gearing (it had a T105 grupo) reached a figurative tipping point 3/4 of the way up the Foymount hill (12%) in the Madawaska Hills NW of Ottawa in late summer 2013, when I just could not get bottom gear on my 12-36 rear cog-mit-24T low front ring.
Too much is enuf, sez I, and when I got home I followed up on a ref I'd heard to Rohloff hubs, and that in turn led me to Thorn Cycles and this forum. The rest is a much more cheerful and relaxed history of the last eight or nine years :)
I finally did sort out the gearing on the Eclipse, in 2018-19. I then enjoyed a couple of years of trouble-free day rides before selling the bike last year to part-finance my Mercury.
On the ref above to Rohloff service in Canada:
I've had only some slightly-less-than-routine issues to deal with (unable to remove my Raven's rear sprocket in order to flip same, in 2017.) But, Alan Wu of Spoke Wrench Cycles in Toronto was able to sort that out with no difficulty at all. Here's his contact info https://www.spokewrench.com/ (https://www.spokewrench.com/)
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But for touring, I would prefer Rohloff over Pinion. For one thing, I prefer a chain over a belt because I use a smaller chainring for lower gear range when I go on a tour than I do for riding near home. It is easy to remove or add a few links when I change chainrings.
You can run a chain on a Pinion. They are not belt-only drivetrains.
I was not aware of that, every photo I have seen only had the belt option. But, my preference for chain is so that i can add or subtract a few links and change chainrings, that would become an expensive endeavor with a belt drive.
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The hubs, as we know, are extremely heavy, rob a lot of energy, produce a lot of drag that leaves you watching helplessly as your mates disappear on descents, and are almost impossible to get parts for or repair when they break down on tour.
I didn't think I needed to make it more obvious that this bit was intended ironically, but perhaps for researchers doen the track I do.
FWIW, in my experience the hubs add negligible weight, feel freer to ride than a well maintained derailleur drivetrain, and produce so little drag that I roll away from my derailleur equipped mates on descents (because I have faster tyres). I can't speak for parts or service because I've never needed them, and it appears that is true of most purchasers.
Thanks Matt for the comments on firm longevity.
John, interesting story about what drove you into the warm embrace of Rohloff. Mine was the reverse problem in similar circumstances: a refurbished derailleur drivetrain kept overshooting the front granny gear on downchanges. Even though I was careful to do them before I needed the extreme inside cogs on the rear. Possibly an issue with the new chain that went on, but the opportunity never again to troubleshoot derailleur malfunctions was too good to pass up.
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RIP: Ride in Peace Herr Rohloff!
Like many of you, I have had little reason to have to come in to contact with the Rohloff company. I ride Rohloff, it rolls and is reliable. Pretty much riding, running repairs and this fine forum are my only links to the great man!
But the mechanical wonder bearing his name has made a huge difference on my life. I’d treated myself to a Rohloff geared bike as an early 50th birthday present to myself to inspire me to ride more to help lose weight after a stroke. I already had good working derailleur bikes and could never justify the purchase till that time even though I had envied a colleague with his Utopia Rohloff bike, but not the entry price to the Rohloff club.
Although my bike doesn’t ride better or worse than my two derailleur bikes, it requires a whole bunch less maintenance and unbeknownst to me at that time circumstances would soon change giving me a huge advantage as a Rohloff owner.
Firstly lockdown. Although bike shops could supply during lockdown, demands were high. But I commuted approx 15,000 km right through lockdown with a bunch of spares in a shoe box just in case. Other than oil changes, a cable replacement and a sprocket/chain exchange, nothing really needed doing.
Just when we were coming out of lockdown I had a series of medical situations keeping from working or riding for a good 6 months. Returning to my reliable Rohloff and the true low maintenance drive train meant I could run components for longer than recommended service intervals without much concern, and it all worked and worked and worked.
I appreciate Herr Rohloff‘s gift to the cycling world. The time I save not needing to repair or maintain my bike means I have more time for my family, more time for myself and more time to recoup and recover during ongoing treatment and side effects of that treatment. Because I am inspired to ride my bike each day I can stay fit even when other parts of my health have not been good in the past year. My doc stated at time I was diagnosed that if I can stay fit, the chances of recovery are greatly improved. And Rohloff is helping me do just that!
Danke Herr Rohloff.
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Utmost sympathy to family and friends. I knew nothing of him as a man, other than what's in the Rohloff Stories book.
What a legacy, what a product, I can't think of much else that's remained so little changed for 25+ years. I think it's future is assured, it's gained a new application on E-bikes, the collaboration with Bosch, so the motor and hub synch, offers the best of both. Like for others the hubs transformed my cycling, not least saving hundreds of hours tedious maintenance!
Yet although the hub is a wonderful piece of engineering, it isn't that which I most respect, Geared hubs were nothing new, around before the derailleur. Neither was the idea of a wide range hub the first, the Sachs 12 speed Elan pre-dates it by a few years, it reportedly got a lot of the engineering right but the quality in production was woefully inadequate and it weighed a ton. The other big brands put plenty of effort into developing IGH's but never seemed to consider their application as anything other than utility. Which brings me to where I have the most admiration for the company - What they had was confidence in the idea that people would spend an unheard of amount of money on a product if it was good enough. And boy did they pull out all the stops to make it good enough! Time has proved the quality, that attention to detail paid off, it's hard to grasp how much effort must have gone into the development. It's not that no one else could have done it, it's that no one else considered it worth doing. When I bought my first it was almost four times the cost a Deore XT groupset. And although I think Moronic is right about the lack of advertising, I've never seen any for the hub in the UK, there was no shortage of promotion which they must have collaborated on. The original Raven was about £300 more than the hub alone and not much more than an equivalent derailleur bike. Whatever the arrangements between Thorn and Rohloff it was being established at well below market value, I wouldn't have taken the plunge if not. I'd already decided I couldn't continue my dirty commute on derailleurs and had been eying up Alfine bikes, the Raven wasn't a hugely expensive upgrade. I don't know the situation elsewhere, but it needed such a collaboration in the UK, where the cycling scene is more sports orientated than in some of our European neighbours and I think Thorn were the perfect match. They've always been prepared to look at things their own way and I think share the belief that people will pay for quality.
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... a refurbished derailleur drivetrain kept overshooting the front granny gear on downchanges. Even though I was careful to do them before I needed the extreme inside cogs on the rear. ...
I think I bought my first chain catcher about a decade and a half ago. I have seen them with different names, I first learned of them as a chain catcher so that is the term I continue to use. It keeps the chain from going too far to the left, that forces it to drop onto the granny gear. The last three bikes I built up, I added the chain catcher with the initial build, did not wait to find later that I needed one.
Mine are plastic and strap around the round seat tube, but they make them to attach in different ways.
First photo, my titanium bike, the chain catcher is black and wrapped around the seat tube, there is a knob near the granny gear.
Second photo, black plastic chain catcher wrapped around my seat tube on my rando (audax) bike. This is a better photo than the first, shows the shape of it better.
Third photo, one on my Sherpa. This photo is over a decade old. Black on black makes it harder to see. I think this is the second one I installed.
This discussion reminds me that I do not think I put one on my Raleigh (yet?), I bought that as a complete bike in 2018, not one that I built up from parts.
Fourth photo, I recalled seeing this photo over a decade ago, it was cited in an article about a race and some knowledgeable photographer spotted this one on a professional racing team bike at a race, simply a piece of thick wire was bent for the purpose and installed on a professional racing team bike. Pretty soon after this photo appeared, you started to see machined ones being sold that looked more professional than a piece of wire. I saved the photo to my hard drive, as a friend of mine kept dropping his chain and he had a front derailleur that mounted that way on his bike.
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The chaincatcher looks like a great idea mickeg.
And thanks to the late Mr Rohloff I'm not likely to need one.
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Rohloff's Instagram page just announced Bernie Rohloff was suffering from complications caused by Parkinson's Disease when he passed.
I organized a small donation drive among local cyclists to a Parkinson's research and support group in his memory. It seemed a nice way to remember his legacy and inventions while helping others. Such organizations are available at local and national levels in many counties if you wish to pay your respects similarly.
Best, Dan.
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RIP: Ride in Peace Herr Rohloff!
Plus 1 to all of Steve's post that starts with the words above.
I've long been of the opinion that the longterm memory of Herr Rohloff will not be the gee-whiz technical superiority in its own time of his hub gearbox, or even its exceptional longevity, but the intangible effects, foremost among them the pure convenience he brought to cycling and cyclists. My cardiologist and my doctor agree that cycling has kept me alive. It is inconceivable to me that on a derailleur bike I would have cycled so much, especially considering that my derailleur bikes were so often stationary, waiting for parts, that I investigated buying a third bike just to have one in rideable condition, which in time led me to hub gearboxes and eventually to the Rohloff. Accession to Rohloff elevated cycling for exercise from a tiresome duty accompanied by oily hands and frustration to a hugely anticipated pleasure, and thus added years to my life. The value of that to my family, my associates, my readers and myself is incalculable, but surely exponentially greater than the price of a Rohloff HGB.
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There's now a statement/tribute on the Rohloff website, in German though Google seemed to do a reasonable translation:
https://www.rohloff.de/de/unternehmen/news/news/wir-trauern-um-bernhard-rohloff?fbclid=IwAR1zuuxvwR22nVLU66NpbS7vPNaxKVm9_CXBMBG8Zz-TwRAlBW7O7Y2IXwo
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From a Facebook posting in answer to a question about the company continuing;
Robert Clark no not at all. The company is owned by its workers through stocks - the middle way between capitalism and socialism ;) They will continue to build the bicycles industry best gearhub.
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Thanks Matt great news!
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The company is owned by its workers through stocks - the middle way between capitalism and socialism ;) They will continue to build the bicycles industry best gearhub.
Thank goodness for that.
I was visualising the sharks circling!
Mike
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Reading of B.R.'s passing made me at last decide to take the plunge ... and I'm now the happy owner of a Mercury.
Been wanting one for ~20 years but always felt that I couldn't justify the cost. But having retired recently I came to the conclusion that [1] you can't take it (£) with you, & [2] if I don't get one now it will soon be too late.
:) :) :)
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Reading of B.R.'s passing made me at last decide to take the plunge ... and I'm now the happy owner of a Mercury.
Congrats on the new bike, it ought to be worthy of a few photos and a thread of it's own.