Hunt SuperDura Dynamo Wheelset Long-Term Review

Generating usable power while riding is many bikepackers’ dream. For years, we’ve discussed the pros and cons of USB rechargeable gadgets versus replaceable batteries and the dangers of letting your navigation or communication device run out of juice on a multi-day bikepacking trip or race. In some ways, having a gadget that converts mechanical energy to electrical energy by harnessing the rotation of your front wheel solves all of that.

Besides the performance, reliability, and price of various dynamo hubs, charging units, and lights, the one setback is that only a few production dynamo wheelsets are available to purchase. Buying a custom-built wheelset is more common but can be pricey and is more involved than offerings from brands with ready-to-ship packages. UK-based Hunt Bike Wheels was among the first to offer such a wheelset and came into the scene with complete dynamo wheelsets priced under $700 USD with a competitive sub-2,000-gram total weight.

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The SuperDura Story + Specs

At the time of launch, Josh Ibbett was the face of the SuperDura Dynamo wheels. In 2017, after two years of working at Hunt, Josh started a year-long around-the-world bike trip and brought the new wheelset along for the ride. Josh has always been involved with product development and testing at Hunt and wanted to offer a dynamo wheelset that was durable enough for loaded bikepacking but also light and versatile enough for commuting and racing. The SuperDura Dynamo wheels, part of Hunt’s 4-Season range, are a testament to this goal with burly and adaptable axle hubs, oversized bearings, durable seals, and corrosion-resistant brass spoke nipples. In short, everything an all-season UK-based rider wants.

Hunt partnered with SON to equip the wheels with the SONdelux hub, their lightest and lowest-rolling-resistance hub. The wheels come standard with 12mm axles but can also be supplied with quick-release end caps. The rear hub features an aluminum body, a four-pawl 28T engagement freehub, and a center-lock disc mount (six-bolt adapters are available). The freehub body is reinforced with steel splines to protect against cassette damage.

For those looking for a 15mm thru-axle option, Hunt teamed up with sister company Mason Cycles and released their Search 29 MTB Dynamo wheelset a few years after the SuperDura came out. The MTB wheels use a 30mm internal width optimized for 2.35″ to 2.6″ tires (they can work with tires up to 2.8″), and the SuperDura wheels have a 20mm internal width and are optimized for 25mm to 28mm tires but also play nicely right up to 50mm/2.0″. Hunt also offers a 650b Adventure Dynamo Disc wheelset optimized for gravel and mountain bike tires up to 2.1″ wide and a 40mm deep/25mm wide carbon gravel wheelset with a SON 28 dynamo hub.

The SuperDura rims are made from 6061-T6 heat-treated aluminum with an asymmetric profile for a balanced and durable construction. They use Hunt’s H-Lock rim sidewall with a small concave area where the tire sits, creating a tight rim-well seal designed to hold the tire in place more securely, which is essential when running lower pressures or while cornering/braking hard. They are tubeless-ready, disc-brake-specific, and only come in a 700c version. Hunt includes universal spade connectors for the dynamo hub, heat shrink, tubeless valves, spare spokes, and your choice of axle adapters.

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Setting up Your Wheels

The SuperDura Dynamo wheels arrived neatly packaged and protected, and Hunt includes everything you need to get rolling. Tubeless tape was pre-installed, and I’m pretty sure I’m still using the same tape four years later, which is surprising considering how many tire swaps the rims have seen. I started with 700 x 44mm WTB Raddler tires, which were easily seated with a floor pump, and I’ve gradually increased the tire size well beyond Hunt’s recommended max size. Most recently, I installed a set of 29 x 2.2″ Ultradynamico Mars Race tires, and their ultra-flexible casing and lightweight construction were next to impossible to set up tubeless with a floor pump. I’ve resorted to running tubes as I haven’t had a chance to borrow a compressor.

Hunt offers several axle kits for the wheels, so as long as you’re not using a bike with boost hub spacing, you should be able to find what you need. Mine came set up for 9mm quick-release, as they originally lived on my flat-bar Trek 520, but I eventually put on 12 x 100mm (front) and 12 x 142mm (rear) caps to work with Emily’s All-City Super Professional and my Hudski Doggler.

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It’s handy that Hunt includes spade connectors and heat shrink for the SON dynamo hub, as it’s one less thing you’ll need to source from your local bike shop or online before wiring your dynamo setup. Peter White Cycles has the most detailed instructions on installing spade connectors to whatever light or USB charger you plan to use. In short, it’s just a matter of stripping your wires, crimping the connectors in place, and applying heat shrink tubing to protect everything.

The spade connectors work great if you’re not removing your wheel regularly, but there are better options for those regularly swapping wheels or tires or simply removing their wheel for transport. Because of this, I upgraded my dynamo hub with a Co-Axial Adapter, which takes the place of two standard 4.8mm female spade connectors and provides a female Co-Axial connector right at the hub axle. It requires some soldering, but with the help of an experienced bike shop or a friend who knows how to solder, the connector feels more secure and is much easier to remove compared to the standard spade connectors. Once again, Peter White Cycles has detailed instructions on how to install the Co-Axial connectors on his website.

One Year In

As mentioned, the SuperDura Dynamo wheels bounced between my Trek 520 and some other review bikes during their first year. During this period, I spent a good amount of time commuting 60 kilometres most days through the wet and muck of my first coastal British Columbia winter. If there were any conditions that would test the hubs’ ability to withstand nasty weather, this was it.

Thankfully, Hunt specs their rear hub with waterproof grease that’s apparently specifically engineered for UK weather, where all of their products are tested and developed. The rear hub uses replaceable sealed cartridge bearings with dual full-contact seals. Despite being SON’s lightweight hub option, the SONdelux 12mm dynamo hub is just as robust as the heavier SON 28 hub and features the same high-quality finish and construction. Inside, it uses a smaller magnet to reduce drag and weight, which means slightly less power output at low speeds, but at normal gravel/road riding speeds, the difference is minimal.

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After a year of light gravel riding and commuting, both hubs were still spinning smoothly, and I had yet to experience any durability issues or setbacks. While I wouldn’t say they offered any noticeable improvement in ride quality over any basic, stock aluminum wheels, their asymmetric 32-spoke construction offered some peace of mind and a predictable, stiff ride quality. The real bonus is that you get all of that alongside the benefits of a high-quality dynamo hub without a whole lot of extra weight.

Four Years and Mixed Reviews

The Hunt SuperDura Dynamo wheelset has bounced between many bikes over the last four years, logging well over 5,000 kilometers of mixed-terrain riding. They started out on my deeply missed custom Trek 520 flat bar build, powering a SON eDelux II light for strict commuting duties. They found their way onto a few review bikes over the years and, most notably, were installed on my Hudski Doggler for my original scouting trip on the 1,000-kilometer Tree to Sea Loop on Vancouver Island in the fall of 2021. After that, they lived on Emily’s All-City Super Professional for commuting and a few local bikepacking trips but have made their way back to my Hudski Doggler as my go-to gravel/commuting rig.

This spring, I decided it was about time to pop open the hood and see how the factory grease was holding up on the rear hub. To my delight, there was still lots of fresh grease on the freehub pawls and inside the freehub shell. There was virtually no contamination or dirt, which was surprising, and the bearings still spin like new. The rims themselves are also spinning true despite a number of big hits over the years.

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While my experience with the wheels has been overwhelmingly positive, I’d be remiss not to mention the mixed reviews you’re likely to find online. Hunt wheels have a reputation of being affordable but not particularly reliable. It doesn’t take long to find reviews that don’t align with my experience, including everything from un-greased freehubs straight from the factory and rims cracking after just a few rides. This isn’t great to read when shopping for a wheelset, especially for dynamo-equipped wheels that are likely going to take most people far from services. The number of reported issues on Hunt wheels gave me some pause, but based on my first-hand experience with them over four years, I’d happily recommend the SuperDura Dynamo wheels to a friend.

There are ramblings online claiming Hunt is simply offering cheap rebranded Chinese-made wheelsets. Instead of accepting this as fact, I ran this by the SuperDura Dynamo poster child himself, Josh Ibbett. First, Hunt wheels are not made in China. Aside from the new Sustain range, which is predominantly made in Europe, most Hunt wheels are manufactured in Taiwan, where the top manufacturers are located. While some rims are open source—where brands simply pick a design from a catalogue and rebrand it—Josh explained the vast majority of Hunt rims are designed specifically for them, and Hunt invests a lot of time and money in research and development to ensure they are creating a good product. Yes, buying directly from China is an option and likely even cheaper than Hunt, but Josh says you lose out on warranties, customer service, and spare part availability, all offered by Hunt.

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Dynamo Wheelsets Compared

There’s only a short list of readymade dynamo-equipped wheelsets available, which makes finding a direct competitor to the SuperDura Dynamo wheels challenging. The convenience factor is largely what sets these wheels apart from other options, which includes paying for a full custom wheelset, building your own, or finding a wheel brand that offers dynamo hub upgrades. For example, NOBL Wheels has the option to add a SON 28 dynamo to any of their wheelsets for an extra $430.

Another option is to purchase a custom wheelset directly from an online-based builder, like ProWheelBuilder.com. I was curious how much a comparable dynamo wheelset would cost through their online wheel builder tool, and I was surprised by what I discovered. A wheelset based around entry level DT Swiss G 540 rims, a SONdelux front hub, and a DT Swiss 350 rear hub ends up costing about $930 and weighs approximately 2,300 grams (81.1 ounces). I expected custom-specced wheels to be more expensive. Compared to the Hunt SuperDura Dynamo wheelset’s $1,099 price tag, that’s a great value considering the parts. You could even upgrade to US-made Velocity Aileron rims for a small increase in price. However, considering that Hunt regularly offers sales and that the SuperDura Dynamo wheels are currently 25% off at $825, they are a great option for anyone on a budget.

The closest ready-made dynamo wheels that you can purchase quickly online are all priced around the $1,000 mark, with the Sonder Alpha wheels being the only exception. The Hunt SuperDura Dynamo wheels weigh slightly less and are the only ready-to-order wheels that come with a high-quality SON hub instead of some sort of rebranded (in most cases, a Shutter Precision hub) dynamo hub. SON hubs are made in Germany and are the pinnacle of quality and reliability, and they’re backed by a five-year warranty. Shutter Precision hubs are made in Taiwan and seem to be less reliable. Shimano XT dynamo hubs are made in Japan, user-serviceable, and readily available. If you need a refresher on dynamo hubs, chargers, and lights, make sure to check out our Real-World Guide to Dynamo Hubs.

Parting Thoughts and Looking Forward

Aluminum wheels tend to get a bad rap compared to their carbon counterparts, but I’d argue that modern aluminum wheels are often just as nice to ride and a fraction of the cost of carbon. Carbon wheels are inherently stiffer than aluminum, which can translate to a solid, responsive ride quality at best or a harsh one at worst. The SuperDura Dynamo wheels feel just as solid now as they did on day one and ride great paired with 45mm or larger gravel tires. Despite being a touch wide for their 20mm internal width, the 2.2″ Ultradynamico Mars tires that are currently installed on the wheels don’t bulge awkwardly off the rim and are still supported enough for unpaved rides.

The four-pawl, 28-tooth engagement of the rear hub isn’t as snappy as the mountain bike wheels I normally ride, but for gravel and pretty much anything aside from technical singletrack, it’s sufficient. Considering how well my wheelset has held up, it’s hard to imagine splurging for the Hunt 40 Carbon Gravel Dynamo Wheelset, which is nearly double the price of the UltraDura Dynamo wheelset and only about 100 grams lighter. However, I can’t help but wish the UltraDura wheels were a touch wider to properly accommodate wide gravel tires. I haven’t ridden anything narrower than 2.0″ wide in years, and my idea of a gravel tire is at least 50mm wide in most cases.

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Regarding the dynamo hub itself, I’ve had no issues powering several different lights and charging setups. I’ve powered the SON Edelux II and kLite Ultra directly from the hub. I’ve also added the new kLite Micro USB Charger and its larger sibling, the standard kLite USB charger, with no issues. Although I wouldn’t consider myself a dynamo diehard, I think narrower gravel wheels make great wheels for dynamo setups as you tend to roll faster and have a higher average speed. Riding slow, including technical singletrack, means most dynamo-powered lights will flicker and or dim, and the best results are reached when riding at 15-20km/h (9-13mph), depending on the setup.

Looking forward, we can expect to see an updated version of the SuperDura Dynamo wheels in the coming months. According to Hunt, the wheels will be updated to the 22mm internal rim found on their 4 Season All Road Disc, and the rear hub will feature the H-Ratchet 36T engagement freehub. The updated freehub also means Hunt can offer more freehub options, including MicroSpline. The version I’ve been testing isn’t compatible with MicroSpline because the standard wasn’t yet mainstream at the time of launch. These updates mark the beginning of a complete dynamo wheel lineup update and several new models. We’ll be sure to share more soon, but until then, Hunt has the SuperDura Dynamo wheels on sale for 25% off.

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• Model Tested: Hunt SuperDura Dynamo Disc Wheelset
• Weight: 1,939 grams (68.4 ounces)
• Place of Manufacture: Taiwan
• Price: $1,099 USD (currently 25% off!)
• Manufacturer’s Details: Hunt Bike Wheels

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Further Reading

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