Hey,

I've already got some FC 404's and some FC 808's but I'm looking for something I can ride in really windy wet races (ie Tour of Southland in NZ, Tour of Tasmania in Aus etc). So thinking Alloy and Tubular as they'll be a race wheel that I wan't to be light-ish... Also because of weather I'll be using them in there is the chance of crashing and I know Velocity rims aren't expensive so easy and cheap to replace if needed.

For rims I'm thinking Velocity Escape. Hubs I'm tempted by a set of bikehubstore.com hubs for price vs weight and from what I have the read the quality is quite high too. Easy to bang some ceramic bearings in them and away I go if the stock ones aren't anything to special. Spokes I'm open to ideas. I only weigh 70kgs so weight isn't really an issue.

Any ideas or better options for any of the parts above would be awesome.

Cheers in advance.

I built up some wheels this year just for this reason. I used Escape Tubular rims, 28h front and rear, revolution spokes, and 240s. Vittoria Corsa Evo Tech tubulars. They are bad ass in the rain. Light (1280grams), stiffish, and super cheap. The hub is really easy to overhaul if need be as well. No tools needed, just pull the freehub body off with your hands, clean the insides, re-lube and push the freehub back on. bing bang boom.

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green jacket, gold jacket...who gives a sh*t

Nice, they sound like the wheels for me! What was the quality of the rim like?

Personally, I prefer a Durex or other heat-treated rim for the rain, etc. I find that they have better braking feel and last a long tome with grime being driven-in to the rim. I like Ambrosio best. Build them with 'factory' hubs (Campagnolo or Shimano) that you can re-build yourself, lace them with Sapim spokes and you will have the ultimate foul-weather weapons.

If you also do not have to contend with really bad road surfaces, you can use a mix of Vittoria CX and SC (front/rear) with good results.

Hi,



Aren't those a little too hmmmm....slippery?

Ciao,

P.S. Plenty of Ambrosio Nemesis builds on P-R again this year. (Had to add something useful, didn't I?)

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Being a snob is an expensive hobby.

The quality of the rims are pretty good. I'd say, as with all things, you get what you pay for. I literally spent around 500 bucks on these and more than half of that was in hubs. I think even at full retail the rims are about 40 bucks a piece. Crashing in the rain is something that just happens, so I wanted to have a rim that could replaced without batting an eyelash. The hubs will almost always be ok in the event of a wreck, and for a rain wheel I would think that one would want something that is pretty serviceable and known for durability.

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green jacket, gold jacket...who gives a sh*t

Ambrosio Crono F20. Low, lighter than Veloctiy and Nemesis and works really well. Good looking too.

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/jonas l
http://cerrol.wordpress.com (my cyclingblog)