Orient Express - Cheap Chinese Rims / Wheels / Forks / Frames / Cranks / Etc

Hmm. Maybe. What's the steerer length?
My rad mumbiek has a borrowed fork with no eyelets.

Won't be able to tell you until I'm at the garage. But it's conveniently placed for us so maybe I'll PM and we can arrange for you to have a look, I need to grab some other bits from there soon anyways

sounds good let's do that.

I just did my first ride on a 11spd ztto cassette. Shifting was bit klunky, but otherwise no major issues with my di2 setup. Can’t say anything about wear and tear yet obviously.

I have just received one of those death trap disc brake mounts that sits on the axle and clamps onto the seatstay. I'll upload a picture when I've decided which bike I hate enough to put it on

My lb wheelset has finally arrived in the UK, and tracking shows that it is as follows “London East Depot: Awaiting payment of customs charges” but I have no more info than that. Has anyone got experience of this?

you'll get a postcard/RM letter through the door with the relevant info on it and then you can pay/clear you item and choose delivery date from what i recall

Thanks!

As I've ordered from Hongfu before I got sent a list of their clearance frame offers (in the attached pdf). Might be of interest to someone. Sale ends 15th August contact Kate if interested

1 Attachment

• stock list and price-2020.8.4.pdf

£112 sound about right for customs charge on a wheelset? Don't know what I was expecting but thought it would be less than that!

What was the value?

£112 sound about right for customs charge on a wheelset?

Yes, duty and VAT (the latter applying to shipping as well as the goods) will add almost 25% to the invoice value.

LB advised that they declare the value at $220 as that is their normal procedure

I expect so. VAT at 20% of the wheel's value plus import duty and maybe handling fees

If in doubt, ask for the full breakdown of duty rates and basis values which give rise to the customs charge. Some bicycle parts from China are subject to anti-dumping/countervailing duty of about 48%, I haven't been through all the affected TARIC codes to see whether crabon fribé wheels are included in that.

They offer a shipping option with prepaid taxes and fees now. I went for this (on a Bitex wheelset) a few weeks ago. It was around this amount.

Presumably HMRC have a reasonable idea of retail price

Thanks for all the feedback. The breakdown is given as follows -
Customs duty £37.77
Import VAT £61.51
Clearance Fee £12
To be honest I'm not that bothered - they are wheels coming from China, of course there will be import, but at this point it works out more expensive than the shipping that @miro_o mentioned, so maybe useful for anyone here making future purchases from LB to just go with that option!

I've done two LB orders, prepaid taxes on one of them. The end price was exactly the same after customs as they opened and revalued the contents.

Is anywhere offering a 28w x 60d (ish) wheelset? LB have 25 x 65 and 30 x 50 but nothing in between. I want 28w because tyre clearance is tight but the 30mm wide rims might be a stretch and I don’t know if they’ll fit DA7900 brakes. 25w is ok but I’d like more comfortable clearance for a 28mm tyre.

Reading LB’s website they offer at least 2 braking surfaces for the non-disc braked rims. Aside from the price difference is there any tangible way to assess the difference? I’ve seen “High TG surface” and “Grooved Graphene surface”

And my second question to any of you running either of these surfaces; how do they perform in damp / wet / downpour conditions compared to an aluminium rim?

Thirdly what pads are a proven choice to use with these rims?

And my second question to any of you running either of these surfaces; how do they perform in damp / wet / downpour conditions compared to an aluminium rim?

Badly, IME.

Thirdly what pads are a proven choice to use with these rims?

Swissstop Black Prince. Still not as good as an alloy rim though.

As @Brommers says. Have been riding the grooved surface for the last 6 months. Hopped on a bike with alloy braking surfaces today and even in the dry it is night and day. Maybe the rims wont delaminate on descents but stopped performance hasn't improved anywhere near as much.

Yeah I echo the same experience. Rim brake performance on carbon is frighteningly bad. Literally frightening.
Scary moment for me coming down a hill in the rain with a roundabout at the bottom. Sold the wheels after that. Fuck dying for the sake of rad looking deep section rims.
But if you absolutely have to have carbon rims then disc brakes are the only valid option

The grooved graphene surface will perform as well as disc brakes. Also search for “basalt brake surface”.