New Wheels---To Enve or not ot Enve.....

[joseph42s]

Picked up a new dogma f8 about 3 months ago. At the time I purchased HED Ardenes to keep the overall price down a bit. I am thinking about upgrading to some carbon wheels, but Its a tough choice. I test rode the Enve 3.4's the other day and unfortunately it was on a completely new route with lots of climbing and I didn't really get a feel for them. I Felt on the flats when they really got spinning close to 20mph is when they felt the best. On the climbs and in the canyons where you be going 10mph I felt that I was dragging them up the hill ( I kept checking for brake drag). Then in the quick fast curvey sections I felt like the cross winds made life a bit exciting, not to bad, but still displeasing.

Now here is the question.

- Is there a better wheel set out there for these kinds of rides. I live in Southern California and its pretty much my standard riding scenario rolling terrain and big climbs 2x a week.
- Bike shop guy is in love with Reynolds new 46 aero, says they dont have the cross wind problems.
- Also it made me realize just how good these "cheap" Ardennes are. And they are lighter then just about any of the carbon wheels I am looking at.

The bike sure as hell looks sexier with the enve's....but I am not sure they are for me. Anyone have similar experiences? Zipp 303? New Reynolds?

Thanks for the advice.

[Zoro]

Look at the Mercury M5s. We also live in SoCal.
We have Mercury, Easton, have had Reynolds RZRs, and Zipp 404. M5s far preferred.
If you are not doing 25mm wide now - that is a factor.

[joseph42s]

The Ardennes are 25mm

[joseph42s]

Man there are almost endless choices.

[bm0p700f]

If you ride up and down canyon why bother with carbon. surely a simple alloy clincher or alloy tubular wheelset will surfice. Why not a carbon tubular wheelset using light rims. ENVE do some 250g shallow tubular rims. That's almost no weight to drag around. Or perhaps the ENVE 4.5 rims. 300g each for the tubular and clinchers are not much more.

[joseph42s]

I have not really looked into tubulars, mainly because I'm not sure they would be good everyday wheels. I'm not then type of rider to constantly be switching wheels.

[mellowJohnny]

I'd say keep test riding wheels if you can. How about 202s? Nice and light, spin up fast, well behaved in cross winds. I don't own a set of 303s, but could be a decent compromise if you want something a bit deeper. I'm thinking of running a 303 rear to pair with a 202 front - you could mix and match any of the Zipp depths pretty easily if you wanted to.

[wingguy]

If you definitely want a deeper wheel the Enve 3.4 should be one of the best and most stable sets out there. Something like the new, wider Bora 35 could be worth looking at for a moderate depth rim with great lateral stiffness and snappy feel under power.

Otherwise if you wanted something that had similar characteristics to the Ardennes but better / better looking the new R-Sys SLRs look pretty damn badass on any bike and both out of the saddle climbing and braking is fantastic.

[joseph42s]

Those are sick! When I tested the dogma the bike I was riding had them on. They were nice, squealed like crazy though, I thought it might get old. Does that go away?

[joseph42s]

*when braking

[nlouthan]

I splurged on ENVE 3.4 Tubulars with Tune hubs last summer and absolutely love them. My other set of wheels are Campagnolo Shamal Ultras that I run tubeless. The 3.4s are much lighter, faster and sexier in every way. As far as side winds, I find the 3.4s to be a little more calm. Even if there is more overall "push" from a side wind, it's much more controllable. In fact, in a steady, heavy crosswind, I'm much more aware of the push against my body than I am the front wheel. I'm 1.8m, 80kg, so you're experience might be different.

I haven't ridden the new Bora 35s yet, but now that they are wider, they'd be at the top of my list as well. Only read great reviews of the new braking surface and Campy hubs are my favorite.

[joseph42s]

Nice! I thought it may have been the hubs that just felt sluggish to spin up. The general feeling on the enve 3.4's was super smooth/slippery at20mph, but steep sections or stoplight restarts it just felt sluggish.

I'm similar 180cm 81.5kg

[joseph42s]

It was my very first ride on anything other then alloy's.

[bm0p700f]

Tubular wheels are everyday wheels. You live in Socal perfect for tubs. If I lived there I would ride nothing else all year round. As it is I tubs a fair bit the U.K but given is always raining at present I have given them a pause for a tubeless setup actually I just want to try tubeless and I like it.

Wide rims are a must I think, mavic rims are not wide so handling will suffer a bit. I like HED rims and there tubular 23mm wide rim is lovely.

[wingguy]

Re: Exalith squealing - the first gen could be pretty bad if the brake pad toe in wasn't perfect. All of the newer ones I've heard have been pretty good. You can definitely hear it, but more of a whir than a squeal.