Search results for:

Has anyone really spent much time with the ultra-light Ryde rims? I've been somewhat curious about them - the low max spoke tension is a turnoff but the weight is pretty excellent.

@cable What spoke count are you planning on using, and how much do you weigh?

@miro_o yeah, they're a massive extravagance, especially at high spoke counts.

I've done a set, and have been pretty pleased. They're very similar to the Velocity A23 in terms of size, and are about as round as those which is better than the SL23.

This actually is the case. They're not quite as appalling as they used to be, but Kinlin still rates around the bottom of the barrel as far as rims I've built, along with the Stans Alpha 340. They're wont to come out either not entirely round or not entirely true out of the box, which makes it extremely difficult to build them well enough to be reliable. H+Sons on the other hand tend to be quite round and easy to build.

As for the braking woes, if toeing and sanding the pads doesnt solve things, the next most likely cuplrit is the wheels being either out of true, or some inconsistency in the brake track. I'd check the trueness of the wheels, and try to isolate the part of the rim where the noise/juddering is coming from, and see if there's anything out of order about that spot. Old non-machined rims had a greater susceptibility to this, which would explain the issues with the MA2s.

@dave4 I've built a lot of them personally :). To make tyre mounting easier, stay far away from Velox tape - use the thinnest rim strip you can find, ideally just tubeless tape without valves.

The rims themselves are so-so, made by Sun-Ringle. Their size makes them fairly easy to build, however they're not quite as round as the Hed/H Plus Son/Velocity (gasp!) et al. The weight is OK, however one can save a bit by sticking with the SL23s. Those are already wide enough as to be fairly aerodynamic with a 23c tire, so going even bigger seems superfluous.

Beware of early ones, which had an awful propensity to crack at the spoke holes. Mounting tires is fairly tough, but manageable with good technique and strong thumbs.

Are you looking for alloy tubulars or clinchers specifically?

I've felt that the continued existence of the R-sys has been due to Mavic's pride preventing them from admitting that they had made a mistake in releasing them in the first place. They are very light, and their Exalith/Keronite/PEO/* coating does look nice and brake well, but spending all that money for literally the least aero wheels made will always be baffling.

As for the Hed Ardennes Black, they look intriguing, but Hed has apparently had a very hard time actually delivering any of them into the hands of consumers.

can you find Ultegra 6800 wheels that cheaply? They're probably the best cheaper wheelset out there right now, a big improvement from their non-series R wheels.

White Industries T11s

Both internal and external matter - internal determines the effective width of the tire where it contacts the road, more external width tends to imply better stiffness.

They've been popping up on internet forums lately. The weight is really heavy for a narrow rim, the build looks accordingly bottom-shelf.

Hed Ardennes wheels are unfortunately hamstrung by really bad hubs.