Zipp

Cognition Freehub Body

Your rims are no joke, but you've been known to guffaw at your hubs that just don't engage like they used to. This shouldn't mean that you've got to upgrade the whole wheelset, instead, upgrade your hoops with a new Cognition Freehub Body, and bring your wheel into the future with unmatched stability and stiffness. The hub is centered on Zipp's Axial Clutch mechanism, which features two Metal Injection Molding (MIM) ratcheting rings — one mated to the freehub body and one mated to the hub body. The two rings are machined like a ratchet, so they ramp off of each other while freewheeling but engage each other during pedal input.

Compared to a standard pawl design, which actually resembles a drum brake, the Axial Clutch's MIM rings engage laterally to reduce friction while freewheeling, so coasting doesn't negate watts already spent. We're familiar with this model, as we've seen similar mechanisms on the designer hubs featured in top-end custom builds for years now, but Zipp is the first to replace the usual tensioning agent, steel springs, with magnets. This substitution further reduces friction between the ratcheting rings, making for what may be the smoothest freewheel on any mass-produced hub set. It's a design that we suspect will eventually be the norm, but — once again — Zipp is leading the charge.