Shimano Deore M525 Disc Hub

2.13/5

(80 Reviews)

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MSRP : $27.50

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Product Description

Shimano Deore M525 36 hole front disc hub is a smooth rolling hubThat is strong and durable. Use 6-bolt ISO disc mounting surface Front WheelType: Mountain Front Hub Spacing: 100 mm Front AxleType: 9x1 Weight: 304 g Intended Use: Mountain Hub Drilling: 36 spokes Hub/Brake Compatibility: 6-Bolt Disc

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Reviews 1 - 15 (80 Reviews Total)

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Submitted by Chris Conrow

Date Reviewed: December 16, 2012

Strengths:    Lasted for 2 years

Weaknesses:    Front hub is just fine, but the rear hub is horrible. After few months of being unused, it won't rotate smoothly. The freehub is crap, it makes a lot of vibration. It is also a pain in the ass to maintain the rear hub. The cones and bearings are also of cheap quality. They make clacking sound after some time of use.

Bottom Line:

The rear hub is really bad for medium to heavy use. Just invest more money for better hub.

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Submitted by havanother a Cross Country Rider from Singapore

Date Reviewed: April 3, 2012

Strengths:    Spins around to start with

Weaknesses:    Stops spinning around after a relatively short period of time

Bottom Line:

Came stock, did the job for a short while. Within 3 or 4 months was making nasty crunching noises. A few months later, there's so much play in it, it's unridable. Fine for stock I guess, but if you have a choice in the matter, it's worth investing in something better. Certainly if you're going to rebuild the stock wheels on your bike, get rid of them. Because once you've paid for rims and laced your spokes, you don't want to be pulling it all apart again on account of a cheap hub like this. I'm a big Shimano fan but hub is not their best work.

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Favorite Trail:   Butterfly

Duration Product Used:   1 Year

Purchased At:   Stock on Stumpjumper

Similar Products Used:   LX, SLX, Hope

Bike Setup:   Stock Specialized Stumpjumper 2011

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Submitted by zachkh a Cross Country Rider from Michigan

Date Reviewed: June 29, 2011

Strengths:    cheap

Weaknesses:    cheap, I have had the bike for 2 months and the races are shot in the front hub after about 250 miles. I pulled them apart to service them and the race was scored.

Bottom Line:

I'm having new hubs laced in the bontrager duster rims w/ cartridge bearings or getting a new wheelset

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Favorite Trail:   Potawatomi

Duration Product Used:   3 months

Purchased At:   came on my bike

Bike Setup:   2011 fuel ex 8, stock w/shimano 540 pedals.

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Submitted by stu a Weekend Warrior from owings mills, md

Date Reviewed: June 5, 2011

Strengths:    None

Weaknesses:    Fails- Ditto with some other reviewer. M525 freehub body slipped completely under some load and now won't engage the drivetrain ....Left me a nice long walk back to the car!

Bottom Line:

Avoid this Hub - been MTB riding for a long time using 'low-end' components but never had a failure occur on new stuff that left me carrying my bike out of the woods.

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Duration Product Used: 6 months

Bike Setup: Trek HiFi Plus 29er.

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Submitted by BokorSolo a Weekend Warrior from Prince William, VA

Date Reviewed: February 20, 2011

Strengths:    IS Disc compatible, serviceable, high flange and shorter spokes provides for better stiffness.

Weaknesses:    Heavy, not the best free hub engagement.

Bottom Line:

These are definitely a get what you pay for product. Do not expect the lightest, smoothest, most efficient ride from these hubs. They do need to be adjusted at some point when using them, but I took care of that when I first got the wheelset and I only serviced these guys once since then. I figure it is just normal wear and tear. I have since removed them from my normal rotation and upgraded to new centerlock XTs.

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Duration Product Used: 2 Years

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Submitted by haribokid a Cross Country Rider from Scotland

Date Reviewed: February 18, 2011

Strengths:    Good for Xc and trails, Never had a problem and easy to service. Cheap!!

Weaknesses:    You get what you pay for. Not for DH!!

Bottom Line:

Best hub for the price, Easy to maintain and take apart if you are careful and take your time.

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Favorite Trail:   Peebles

Duration Product Used:   1 Year

Purchased At:   came with bike

Similar Products Used:   XT

Bike Setup:   GT Idrive 4.0 Manitou Minute 120mm forks, Manitou S-Type Rear Shock, Magura Julie HP Brakes, Race face evolve Handle bars stem, Deus headset, Lx BB and drivetrain, deore hubs, rims mavic en321

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Submitted by wareagle a Weekend Warrior from Frisco, TX, USA

Date Reviewed: January 30, 2011

Strengths:    Inexpensive, looks good

Weaknesses:    The freehub body is complete junk

Bottom Line:

This hub came on a set of Sun Rhyno Lite wheels I purchased as an upgrade to my stock wheels.

I have now experienced TWO freehub body failures in 4 months after "upgrading" to these hubs. The failure mode is first the pawls in the freehub start "catching" causing ghost pedalling, and "slipping" on steep climbs when you're really mashing the pedals, then eventually on one of the slips the freehub fails completely and just freewheels both ways.

I ran the stock wheels that came on my Rockhopper with an FH-RM30 hub, a pretty low-end hub, for 3 years with no issues. So this is not a case of expecting too much from a cheap hub. The M525 hub (the freehub body in particular) is just pure garbage.

Oddly, yesterday my friend's freehub failed on him, and low and behold he too had an M525 hub. Stay away from this hub unless you enjoy pushing your bike long distances.

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Favorite Trail:   Northshore, OCNP, Boulder

Duration Product Used:   6 months

Price Paid:    $150.00

Purchased At:   Performance Bike

Similar Products Used:   Shimano FH-RM30 rear hub

Bike Setup:   Specialized Rockhopper

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Submitted by mikeMX a Cross Country Rider from wall. nj

Date Reviewed: September 19, 2010

Strengths:    none, unless you like your bike parked and like to spend hours with greasy hands looking for little ball bearings on your garage floor, nevermind going from dealer to dealer looking for the lost left cone!

Weaknesses:    came on 2008 Jamis Dakota Elite. constant problems. rebuilt, repacked several times, tightened right locknut to point of striping it. Now I need a new FreeHub, and left cone which f'in shimano doesn't supply.

Bottom Line:

Paul Morningstar from http://www.morningstartools.com/products_index.html
was a big help. He has tools that you can disassemble the freehub and add more springs which will allow you to grease the internals of the freehub vs non sealant high viscosity oil.

I'm looking into cartridge type bearings now as I'm S.O.L. and searching for a left cone to rebuild and then use wheel as a spare. I'm also looking for other than Shimano, along with another dealer, as the dealer was happy to sell me a new hub and lace up my old wheel to it for $120. All because Shimano dared to put out this low quality item, and then put it on a race xc bike that I paid $1900 for. I guess I should blame Jamis for that last part, but there just trying to reduce costs, how would they know they were building a bike that had cheese wiz parts on it?

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Favorite Trail:   Allaire

Duration Product Used:   2 Years

Price Paid:    $1900.00

Purchased At:   dealer

Bike Setup:   xc hardtail, fast sandy, rutted, rooted East coast mud trails.

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Submitted by jamesmoore007 a Weekend Warrior from UK

Date Reviewed: August 23, 2010

Strengths:    Good Hub for the price

Weaknesses:    I spent an unbelievable length of time working out how to fix the loose locknuts.. same problem reported all over by different reviewers

Bottom Line:

During some routine maintencance noticed my back wheel wasnt spinning very much compared to the front wheel. After inspecting the hub i found that the locknuts were so loose they could be turned by hand... and i'd been riding around on like this for months! I stripped the hub and refitted it all, but the right hand lock nut was always spinning loose, just using fingers... and it was impossible to set the hub up properly with the cones at the right tension. I found the way to do it - undo the whole assembly on the axle, pull the axle out, put the right hand cone (drive side) in the right position on the axle, then put on the washers and then tighten down the right hand locknut as hard as possible, with the axle out of the hub. Now rebuild the hub, and you should be able to tension the hub properly by adjusting the left hand cone and locknut as normal.... what a headache.

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Favorite Trail:   Cwmcarn

Duration Product Used:   1 Year

Price Paid:    $20.00

Purchased At:   Wiggle

Similar Products Used:   Shimano hubs

Bike Setup:   Hardtail

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Submitted by john s a Cross Country Rider from england

Date Reviewed: June 11, 2010

Strengths:    cheap i guess

Weaknesses:    they like to destroy themselves, fast.

Bottom Line:

basically, all the people who say theyve been running these for how long and done no maintainence on them, if they took them apart i can gaurantee the insides will be shot.

ive serviced mine twice now, and both times the insides needed a complete overhaul. the first the races had become pitted on both sides of the hub, and the second time the one race had pitted and ground down one side of the ball bearings aswell.

also you CANNOT buy spares, full stop. so for me to replace the parts i need to buy another whole hub just to take out the parts i need. good thing theyre relatively cheap. but theres a reason they are, THEY SUCK HARD.

overall zero chillis, im getting sealing bearing hubs ASAP

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Favorite Trail:   brechfa black route

Duration Product Used:   2 Years

Bike Setup:   stock 07 gt avanche 1.0 disk

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Submitted by MikeN a Cross Country Rider from Hudson, Wi

Date Reviewed: June 7, 2010

Strengths:    None!

Weaknesses:    Have been running the wheels with these hubs for 3 months and am on my 3 trip to bike shop. Pure crap! I dont pound my bike! I trail ride. These are just junk!

Bottom Line:

Don't waste your money! Getting my wheels re-laced with a different hub!

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Favorite Trail:   White Tail Ridge

Duration Product Used:   3 months

Purchased At:   Wheel World

Bike Setup:   Trek 4300 with Sun Rynolites, disc's, and few other goodies

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Submitted by raygun a Cross Country Rider from new york, ny

Date Reviewed: May 26, 2010

Strengths:    Easy to maintain (thankfully since it so often they need maintenance!), cheap.

Weaknesses:    loose bearings, poor seal, weak cones, a little heavy

Bottom Line:

Easy to maintain and clean out the (loose) bearings. Cup and cone design is for lower end bikes. Not sealed bearings. I was constantly cleaning the bearings and adjusting the cone bolts...too tight and cones create friction; too loose and the wheel feels wobbly. After two seasons, cones were pitted to hell and rolling resistance was high. Avoid these at all costs!

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Favorite Trail:   "monster" at blue mountain

Duration Product Used:   2 Years

Similar Products Used:   dt swiss 240, specialized stout, hadley, hope pro, shimano saint

Bike Setup:   2007 Epic Expert

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Submitted by jeduncan a Cross Country Rider from Johnson City, TN, USA

Date Reviewed: April 12, 2010

Strengths:    Low price.

Weaknesses:    Freehub body explodes when you least expect it.

Bottom Line:

I've been through three freehub bodies on these things. I can't believe how easily they have broken. I don't race, I just ride casually, and every 4 or 5 months the freehub disintegrates. I have ridden other wheelsets for much longer times under much harsher conditions and have not had this happen, so I'm guessing it's not something I'm doing.

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Duration Product Used:   2 Years

Similar Products Used:   Shimano XT disc hubs

Bike Setup:   Haro Mary

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Submitted by Crymar a Weekend Warrior from Arlington VA

Date Reviewed: April 8, 2010

Strengths:    Stylish design w/satin black finish.

Weaknesses:    None so far.

Bottom Line:

Something strange is going on when people love and hate the same product. People seem to think that this is a high-line hubset. It isn't, so don't expect it to perform like one. These hubs weren't designed for competition or gonzo off-road riding, but for casual on- off-road use. If you beat your bike, get XT and XTR or spend $100's more and go for the exotics. I've ridden Deore hubs relatively hard (I weigh 240) for around six months on pavement and trails and they perform superbly. If the bearing nuts come loose, they're not being adjusted and tightened properly. I'm an ex-bike mechanic and I've never had hub bearings loosen when adjusted properly and the wheel installed correctly. These hubs perform great for what they were designed for. From the standpoint of value-for-money, you can't get any better.

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Duration Product Used:   6 months

Price Paid:    $50.00

Similar Products Used:   Shimano Dura-Ace, Ultegra, 105, Sanshin,

Bike Setup:   Touring style MTB

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Submitted by aaronutah2 a Weekend Warrior from SLC

Date Reviewed: April 7, 2010

Strengths:    Cheap, work just fine

Weaknesses:    User inattention

Bottom Line:

These came with my Rocky Mountain Element. Lot's of bad reviews. I kept an eye on them because of the reviews. I noticed the cone nuts tend to loosen or tighten when I remove my wheels. Once I started riding and the wheels felt stiff. The hubs had tightened up. This would have wrecked the bearings in a short time. Another time they loosened up. I'll bet if they stay on the bike they don't break. Check the free play every time you put them back on the bike.

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Duration Product Used: More than 3 years

Reviews 1 - 15 (80 Reviews Total)

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Shimano Deore M525 Disc Hub

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