Freewheel Cassette Single Speed 22T — Low-Geared Screw-On Sprocket for Hub Motor Builds

When the Motor Does the Work, Most of Your Gears Stop Earning Their Keep

Fit a rear hub motor from our conversion kit range and the job the gears used to do changes completely. On an unassisted bike you need a spread of ratios because your legs have one narrow power band and hills demand everything outside it. A hub motor makes its own torque independently of what the chain is doing, so the middle of the range you used to shift through becomes redundant — riders find themselves living in two or three sprockets and never touching the rest. Stripping the drivetrain back to a single 22T sprocket takes out the derailleur, the shifter, the gear cable and the whole cluster in one go. That is four fewer things to adjust, four fewer things to break, and a noticeably quieter bike.

The reason to pick a large rear sprocket rather than a small one is what you actually want the pedals to do on an assisted bike. With any given chainring at the front, more teeth at the back means lower gearing — easier to turn the cranks from a standstill with a loaded bike, and easier to contribute usefully on a climb, at the cost of spinning out at speed. On an e-bike that trade is the right way round, because the motor is carrying the top end anyway. It is a gearing choice that suits cargo bikes, delivery work and heavy commuters far better than the fast single-speed ratios sold for road use.

The Freewheel Mechanism, and Why It Matters on an E-Bike

This is a freewheel, not a fixed sprocket. The ratchet inside lets the rear wheel keep turning while the pedals stay still, which on an electric bike is not a comfort feature but a basic requirement — under motor power alone, a fixed sprocket would drive the cranks round at whatever speed the wheel was doing. The freewheel lets the motor pull you along with your feet resting, and picks up cleanly the moment you start pedalling again.

It also has to survive being on the receiving end of a motor. Assisted bikes cover more miles, at higher average speeds, with more torque going through a single set of teeth than any unassisted single speed sees, and the chain is the part that suffers first. Keep a fresh chain on it — a stretched chain will hook the teeth on a single sprocket faster than it would on a geared cluster, because every mile you ride lands on those same 22 teeth rather than being spread across seven sprockets. If you would rather keep your gears, our 7 speed freewheel threads onto the same style of hub.

Fitting It

The sprocket threads onto the hub and self-tightens as you pedal, so hand-tight with a little grease on the threads is enough to start with. Coming the other way, a matching freewheel removal tool is needed — years of pedalling torque means these rarely come off by hand. The bigger part of the job is usually the rest of the conversion: shortening the chain to suit a single sprocket, removing the redundant derailleur and shifter, and setting the chainline. Our workshop in Roath does single speed conversions regularly and can do the lot in one visit, or you can browse the rest of the e-bike parts range if you are building it yourself.

Warranty and Returns

Every single speed freewheel purchased from All4eBikes is covered by a 12-month warranty against manufacturing defects, alongside a 30-day return window.