White Industries XMR Hubs

White Industries XMR Hubs

Rear: 142 x 12mm

Front: 100 x 15mm

Blister’s Measured Weight: 311g rear, 172g front

MSRP: $169-$189 Front

$332.25 – $352.25 Rear (pricing varies based on color)

Laced to: WTB Asym i35 rims

Mounted to: Devinci Spartan Carbon RR

Reviewer: 5’9” 155 lbs.

Test Duration: 1 month

Test Locations: Montana, British Columbia

Intro

White Industries has been in the game for quite a long time; the company was founded in 1978, and thus precedes the first production mountain bike by a few years. During the explosive growth of aftermarket bike componentry in mid-90’s, White Industries had some of the most sought after components on the market.

Since then, many of their competitors have withered away or been bought up and merged with larger brands. But White Industries soldiers on, and continues to crank out an assortment of high quality, nicely machined parts.

Some of their parts fill very specific niches not covered by the larger brands, like their eccentric hub that allows a frame with vertical dropouts to be used as a single speed without a chain tensioner. I’ve taken a look at their new XMR hubs, which are fairly traditional in most senses.

Specs and Options

The XMR hubs are offered in a few different configurations to fit the majority of bikes running disc brakes that are currently on the market. I rode them with a 142 x 12mm rear axle, and a 100 x 15mm front, with a normal 6 bolt ISO disc pattern and a XD driver for use with SRAM 11-speed cassettes.

The front hub came with end caps for conversion to a standard QR, and it’s also available in a 12mm thru axle for use on road and cyclocross bikes. The rear hub can be converted to a standard 135mm QR, and the driver body is also available in a standard Shimano spline as well as a Campy version. The only downside here is that there’s no 20mm front axle option on these hubs.

Update: We’ve confirmed with White Industries that both the XMR and CLD (center lock) hubs are available in Boost spacing.

While the XMR hub is only available as a 6 bolt disc pattern, White also makes the CLD, which is similar in pretty much all respects except that it’s designed for center lock rotors.

The driver body comes standard with 3 pawls and 24 points of engagement, but for no extra charge, you can get an upgraded version that has 48 points of engagement. Each of the three pawls has two teeth, so there’s effectively six points of engagement at all times.

I rode the higher engagement version, which I think is generally preferable for technical riding. The only people I’d point toward the lower engagement are people generating so much torque that they’re tearing up the internals of hubs—in that case, the lower engagement might hold up a little better.

The driver body is made out of titanium, which weighs less than a steel driver body, but holds up much better than the more common aluminum freehubs found on most high end hubs.

NEXT: Details, The  Ride, Etc.