Today I'm looking into how to make that smart trainer of yours a lot quieter
Going from this to
This on the new Tacx NEO 2T.
And from this
to this on the Wahoo Kickr 18
and from this
To this on the Saris H3.
Quiet operation is the new standard in smart trainers. Gone are the days of wind trainers and noisy belts
Whirring away while you're doing your workout waking up your family
Waking up the neighbors at all ungodly hours.
All you'll pretty much hear these days from your NEO,
Your kicker or your H3 is the drive train while you're pedaling along
However when you stop and coast it's a very different story.
The noise you're hearing there is the freehub ticking away
It's the pawls on the freehub ticking up against the engagement teeth as you're coasting along.
A loud freehub
Outdoors could be seen as a desirable thing. It'll let people know you're coming a mile off but indoors, it doesn't really serve any purpose
Other than letting everyone else know that you're slacking off on that workout
You should be going a lot harder on.
So onto the method that I've used over the years to quieten my trainers down indoors
But first up a few notes to make note of this tip is how to make your trainer quieter while coasting
We are shushing the freehub only
Quieting down your pain cave as a whole is another topic but what we're doing today is we're going to the base of the flames
the source of the sound
muffling that first and then we can tackle everything else later on. The results that you get out of doing the same process here may
vary depending on the trainer that you own, the condition that it's in and the
Environments that it's in, but for most direct-drive trainers the principle is the same as what I'm going to show here today
I've encountered no issues whatsoever in performing this task on my indoor trainers
I've even found some trainers ship with almost dry freehub. So doing this can be a good thing and finally the more correct advice
I guess I would call it is that you would lightly grease the freehub teeth and lightly oiled the pawls but that's good for
outdoors and performance
but indoors
you need to step a little further down the rabbit hole and getting into territory that the
Perfectionist will probably start twitching about what I'm about to do here - quite an things down. Okay, let's get into it
Okay, first up covering the tools that I'll be using today we have some high performance grease cassette removal tools
We have a hex key set and some wrenches and a rag, of course to keep things nice and tidy first up
We'll be looking at the Tacx NEO 2T
which as you can hear there has quite a bit of
Ticking to it. Okay through axle bike off - first two cogs need to be removed so I can
Remove the freehub from the trainer
so that adapter comes out and the freehub then just lifts out and
Not a lot of grease out of the factory. You can see the pawls. They're flipping back as they should
But that pretty much explains why the Neo 2T whilst coasting is very loud
Okay, applying the grease on the teeth themselves
Packing the pawls and just making sure they still flip out and they're not sticking down. A really sticky grease
Will make those stick down and that's really not what you want. But that applies on there and
is just fine, okay
Installation reverse of what we did before. Tightening that back up
2 outer cogs on lockring tool
And we are on
Just a few minutes and we are done. Through axle back in
Power back in
And this is with the shotgun mic so it is directly pointed at the trainer so you can hear absolutely everything
Trademark NEO whir there and the coast
1,000,000% better. no question!
This still has that purr to it, not that ratchety tick and just a few tests here to make sure the pawls engaged and
Aren't getting stuck down
The very small fan inside the NEO 2T is what you can hear there which is louder than a free hub now
Alrighty next up the Wahoo Kickr 18
Now again, we need to remove the cassette to get the freehub off. So first two off and
It's a little troublesome dislodging this so we'll take the whole cassette off using the tool here and
There we go, we are off
More grease inside this one, but it's still quite dry grease
Definitely not sound insulating
So we do want to remove all previous grease in there. I don't like mixing two greases together
So removing as much as we can reapplying
very very liberally
And
All over that as well
Back here. Now. If you have trouble getting the freehub back on just turn and press the pawls in
And usually, there'll be a key one that slides in and it will go in
Somewhere about there. There we go
Again the through axle adapter on, cassette back on with the tool.
2 Outside rings and the lock ring
We are on
Bike back on the Kickr 18, through axle through. Native through axle support is absolutely brilliant
Okay up to speed
Again with the directional microphone amplifying the sounds quite a lot here on the video
And
That's pretty darn quiet
Yep, I'm happy with that
Okay some
Engagement tests for the pawls to make sure they're not sticking down
and
That's all good to go there
And finally the grand ratchet of them all the Saris H3 is is very noisy now
They do have quite a bit of packing grease in this which I will take out has a red color to it
Spending a bit of time removing all that's probably the most greased freehub of the three trainers
So repacking that all back in with the new stuff, straight in, no need to take the cassette off at all [background baby calls]
and Max makes an appearance in the background here
The very reason why I want to have quiet trainers
the irony
Little max. Okay, bike back on here the Saris H3 thru-axle in
And we are on for the pedal tests
Okay this spin up
And the wind-down
Probably one of the noisy ones of the three but still very very low in the sound Department
And a few engagement tests just to make
sure, there's no sticking freehub, or the pawls are getting stuck down and
That has done the job. Three from three, happy days!
So there we have it, how to make your silent trainer even quieter than
silent by packing that freehub full of grease but making sure not too much.
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