Weight Weenies

Hi Guys,

I am looking for a wheelset around £500 for a friend of mine. He weighs about 85 - 87kg, wants something in black. He doesn't race, but would like really nice kit. I have talked him out of Kysriums(!) but now am thinking about a different wheelset. I am talking to Legs about getting one built, but stumbled across the Easton pre-builts. EA90 looks interesting, as does the SL and SLX. Anyone have experiences of these?

Any other suggestions?

Rich

I own two pairs of wheels now: Easton ea90 and Shimano DA WH-7850-C24-CL.. Comparing to DuraAce which is twice in price I feel ea90 stiffer and rolling better (though without aero spokes), but really overweighted comparing to Shimano. I'm around 70kg.

p.s. ksirium sl would be about $850 comparing to $500 ea90.. this wheels very strong and stiff, but not aerodynamical..

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If you were to get a set of Kinlins laced to ultegra hubs they would cost considerably less than either of those sets. If they were built well they would last longer and feel stiffer.

I've ridden my EA90 about 200miles now.. so far this is what I notice;

Ride quality, better than my Ksyrium SSC SL's
Rolling, feels smoother than my SSC SL's. But the SSC's do have a few thousand miles.
Quality wise they seem ok. Issue I found was the allen through hole is partially stripped. Appears when they were assembling they didn't insert the wrench all the way in and stripped out the outer portion of it.
Weight, about 10-20 more than advertised.

It's great that you can change to campy, Shim. 9 or 10!

Now over 1k miles. No issues at all..

cycling plus here in the UK recently ran a wheel test and the EA 90SLX came out of it really well. for the ££ they are really light (genuine 1391g), the bearings are great, the build quailty (trueness, tensions etc) spot on, and a proper brake surface.
no real negatives at all.
so good in fact that i'm going to get some for my second - best bike; my Pinarello Paris.

I've ridden the EA90 SL for over a year now and the wheel is still true...despite jumping the seams on the Golden Gate Bridge. It is also very stiff out of the saddle and up climbs. I'm 195lbs (13st, 13lbs) which is why I opted for the SL vs SLX.

My only concern is the day I need to have these wheels serviced. I wonder if there are many shops that are capable to do it right.

Btw, the SL uses steel bearings and I'm thinking about upgrading to ceramic. Has anyone upgraded? If so, do you recommend a brand of ceramic bearings?

thanks in advance.

How do you guys feel about the EA90 aero? Are they a flat out better wheel than my 09 Mavic Ksyrium Elites?

The Elites are a great wheelset. They are not the most aero but they are strong and reasonably light. Very underrated wheel IMO. I've not had one issue in over 7000Km of riding and 20 or so crits. At worst they are a great training wheel for most people I suspect they make a great all rounder. The EA90 Aero is also a well regarded wheelset. Not sure I'd say one is better than the other - both have their place

Do you think the elites higher spoke count make for a better crit wheel? The aero might be better if I want to attempt a break though right?

I've raced on my Elites and my Carbone's and to be honest I can't tell in a crit which ones are better. On the road the Carbones are the best - except on really windy days. You tend to ride in amongst the bunch during a crit so it's hard to 'feel' the benefit of the Aero. Most finishes are sprint finishes so again the whole Aero thing doesn't seem to make a huge difference. Others may have differing opinions.

Ordered the EA90 TT clincher and oing to place a 11-23 SRAM red cassete on it.
With all good feedback I see on the EA90 SLX, might get one for climbing and put a 11-25.

Soon I will have some feedback on both. Wonder if I am going to see big difference.

Do you guys think I will really notice it?

I have the ea90slx's on my bike. I am 155lb, so I don't exactly destroy bikes, but they are surprisingly stiff, considering their weight and great ride quality. They will roll forever if you let them, which is nice going downhill. The brake tracks are perfectly smooth and bearing adjustments are a cinch. The only downside I have found is that if you use a sram pg-1070 cassette at all, you will have to use the R4 freehub body, which uses standard bearings and has considerably more drag than the R4SL. They were true to weight as well, which is always good to see of course.

Appreciate the feedback 743power

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I have a pair of the SLX. The pros I've noticed are what others have already noted: they spin well, are stiff enough, have a nice ride and low weight. The R4 hubs are good and have been easy to work on a bit.

I do, however, have some concerns over the durability. I have broken two spokes on these wheels. This wouldn't be too noteworthy except for the fact that I am pretty light (160 lbs), don't log big mileages and am very light on equipment (never even broken spokes while racing downhill except for sticks getting caught in the wheels). Once I just noticed a rear spoke was broken with no apparent cause. Another time I was stopped at a traffic light. Grabbing the front brake and twisting the bars a bit to stay upright caused a front spoke to break. And since it is a dual threaded spoke, I had to order them from Easton. Kind of a pain.