Open mold wide profile carbon wheels

[Klaster_1]

I have some more Wheels to add shortly

Any chance Light-Bycicle RR46C02 is among those?

[dastott]

Would be very interested to hear your thoughts on Farsports rims/wheels also, if you ever get the chance.

[GlacialPace]

Edit: What are you all using for rim brakes on these ultra wide rims? I have a set of KCNC CR1's and some dura ace 7800's with SRAM red. The KCNC's only open to 27mm without sanding down the pads, and the dura ace 27.5-28mm. I could probably get the dura ace to open to 28.5 if I disassembled and did some grinding I guess.

Shimano sell pads for carbon wheels that are slimmer out of the box, I have 6800 calipers and with the slimmer pads shimano state a max rim width of 28mm

I have some more Wheels to add shortly

Any chance Light-Bycicle RR46C02 is among those?

I also would be very keen for these to be tested, alongside the 25mm wide 55mm deep rims if possible.

Hambini, are the Bontrager rims much deeper that their name would suggest? The 60mm is listed alongside the 88mm YoLeo and the 808, are they similar depths? Also, thank you for all the work and sharing with us, its very interesting

[hambini]

Hambini, are the Bontrager rims much deeper that their name would suggest? The 60mm is listed alongside the 88mm YoLeo and the 808, are they similar depths? Also, thank you for all the work and sharing with us, its very interesting

Nope they are not. They don't have such a blunt profile so when disturbed flow hits it, it's like hitting a bluff body.

Would be very interested to hear your thoughts on Farsports rims/wheels also, if you ever get the chance.

One of my colleagues has some of these so they will be added when we do some more next month

Any chance Light-Bycicle RR46C02 is among those?

If I can find someone with a pair that I can borrow I will add them.

Thanks

Hambini

[GlacialPace]

Interesting thank you, so the standouts from this test are the Yoleo and the Bontrager to me. I'd love for the Light Bicycle RR46C02 to be included, hopefully you can find a pair.

Lastly, you say that a 23mm tyre should be fitted to the front wheel and a 25 to the rear if you want, does this apply even for wider (up to 28mm like the LB rim) wheels? Did you have a control set of tyres and if so what were they?

Thanks again.

[hambini]

Continental GP4000S 23mm were the fixed tyre

Aerodynamically, although others may disagree, 23mm is the way forward on on a front tyre. 25mm creates a lot of drag. Whether this is more or less than the rolling resistance benefit depends on how fast you are going. The cut off point for the front wheel is at a much lower speed than the back wheel because there is less weight on it and it hits the air first so it favours a narrower tyre.

By the time air has reached the back wheel, the bit that is near the ground is going in the same direction of travel and it's drag is low. The remaining 70% of the wheel is exposed to "worked" air and heavily shielded by the seat tube.

[Marin]

Continental GP4000S 23mm were the fixed tyre

Hi Hambini, what are your thoughts on rotational drag? I've seen a pretty convincing study that had low-profile wheels outperform taller rims at low yaw because they also measured the power required to rotate the wheels and found it to be quite significant - I'd love to hear what your opinion is.

I'll link the paper when I find it

(posted this as a comment under the article but here is more practical)

[LouisN]

MODS: I suggest a separate dedicated post, even a sticky, to all wheels "scientific" verified data ( aero, drag, weight, speed, mometum, stiffness, etc..) or tests.
It would be a good thing to mix the generic, less known/underestimated brands mixed with the "well known"/overestimated brands all together in the tests...

Louis

[MayhemSWE]

Does anyone have experience with superlight low profile tubular rims from a reputable manufacturer they can recommend? To be used with 24-28 mm road tires and disc brakes, so preferably rims that can be bought without a visible rim brake track.

FSL25-TM-23 looks great but Far Sports weren't interested in selling to me, says this particular rim is OEM only. Also many more versions of the same rims listed on their dedicated OEM website as the "Alps" series which clearly are what FSE uses for all of their wheels…

[Jugi]

Well, some things are worth the wait. After about 14 months after acquiring the first component (rear hub) of this build, the wheelset is finally ready.

What I wanted:
- An all-rounder wheelset for my cyclocross bike (disc brake), mainly for road cycling
- A wheelset weight of somewhere around 1500g (tubeless tape & valves included), preferably under that
- A rim height between 40-55mm
- Tubeless compatibility

DT Swiss 240s was an easy choice for hubs. I got the rear slightly used for a decent price. Easy to maintain and easy to convert between axle standards. My cyclocross (Felt F4x / 2016) has a 15mm thru axle which seems a bit out dated right now.

DT Swiss 240s SP 24h 15x100mm CL front with DT Swiss 6-bolt brake disc adapter:


DT Swiss 240s SP 28h 12x142mm 6-bolt rear:


Sapim CX-Ray, 52pcs

Disclaimer: I did the typical mistake of ordering everything at once and trusting the specs from manufacturers. 52 CX-Rays in 268mm length are pictured, but I ended up using 264mm for the front wheel. Right now I'm not completely sure where the mistake spurred from, but I suspect DT Swiss's spoke calculator may have given me the dimensions of a 28 hole front hub variant. I decided to use DT Swiss's calculator as this was the first time I built around straight pull hubs. I thought DT Swiss would have the best specs for their own hubs.

Sapim Double Square 12mm nipples, 52pcs


Double Square is not the lightest possible nipple to use, but I appreciate everything that makes building the wheels easier. These are a breeze compared to many other nipples.

DT Swiss nipple shimms, 52pcs


Light Bicycle specifically mentions these rims do not need nipple shimms. However as I built an MTB wheelset with eThirteen's carbon rims about five months ago, I found the shimms to be a nice addition to the construction. I decided to have shimms for this build as well (at the same time making the nipples essentially x0,5 heavier than they actually are).

I won't be needing the brakes much when road cycling, so basically any brake disc was adequate:
KCNC Razor 160mm front brake disc (slightly used):


KCNC Razor 140mm rear brake disc (new):


Shimano Dura-Ace CS-9000 11-28 as the cassette:


And why not weigh in the front tire as well, Schwalbe Pro One 25mm:


Who doesn't love straight pull?


And then to the rims. First up the front: Light Bicycle RR56C02, 24h, disc brake, matte UD, no decals. Specced as 460 g +-15 g:


Light Bicycle RR56C02, 28h, disc brake, matte UD, no decals.


The finish on these rims is just immaculate. I found nothing to complain about. The UD matte has this satin like shine on it, which is so pristine I had a hard time building the wheelset, trying not to stain them with grease and not making hair line scratches with spokes etc. Beautiful.

Light Bicycle tubeless valve stems, long enough to be just right for the RR56C02:


Complete rear wheel with the components mentioned above + Stan's NoTubes tubeless tape:


And the front:


Without brake discs, the wheelset ends up at 1596 g. A little more than I originally planned. Would have gotten closer to 1550 g without the nipple shimms, with a 24h rear wheel and maybe with a different brake disc / adapter configuration.

Immediately after receiving the rims, I thought these might make up a wicked CX wheelset. So just to see how it looked, I put a Schwalbe X-One (33mm) on the rim:


Over here all CX racing abides to the 33 mm rule, so that would be my weapon of choice for racing. Doesn't look too shabby at all.



From Schwalbe's trio (Pro One 25mm, Pro One 28mm and X-One 33mm) the X-One was clearly hardest to install. I managed to install all without tools, but the X-One took some doing. As of right now I don't have a floor pump handy, so I went straight to the compressor. The Pro One's bead popped in place easily but the X-One took about 60 psi to properly lift to the shelf. Then again knowing it is a tight fit, I wouldn't hesitate to run it at "low cyclocross" pressures, because it took some force to get it to drop from the shelf when deflated. At about 60 psi, the X-One measured 35mm in width.



The final product: Light Bicycle RR56C02 rims, DT Swiss 240s hubs and Schwalbe Pro Ones (25mm front / 28mm back):


At about 60 psi, the front measured 29 mm and the rear 31 mm in width. In my point of view both tires fit the rims outer width quite nicely - a 1 mm difference on either side doesn't make a big difference.




I had a secondary objective of dropping the bike's weight under 8 kg with this upgrade. Complete weight: 7,98 kg.


The end result is even better than I anticipated. They fit the overall aesthetics quite nicely. If I need more free speed, I think I have to put some Enve decals on them.

[romanmoser]

nice and weight respected
I've 2 matt ud rims disc on order too
they should ship between today and first september

tell us how the rims are after a few rides

[Hexsense]

If I need more free speed, I think I have to put some Enve decals on them.

please don't make it a counterfeit wheelset. Stand proud of what it is, a Great quality wheel from Light-Bicycle manufactured in China.

[pushstart]

Beautiful wheels. I wouldn't be comfortable with those rotors, but it sounds like you know what you need there. I know I need to drink less beer.

+1 on no counterfeit wheels. LB makes great rims. My first set of LB U45 rims were just raw 3k carbon, but I've decided to get mine all LB-branded from now on. I'm happy to help with the marketing.

[morganb]

Has anyone tried the 56mm deep LBs in rim brake yet? Did you have to shave down pads to fit or will they fit with a modern caliper?

[Jugi]

tell us how the rims are after a few rides

I suffered through a flu during the week and was busy at work as well, so couldn’t really get a ride done. However today I finally managed to get 40k’s of casual spinning done.

This is what I have experience with (what I compare these to):
Easton EC90 SL tubular on my Specialized Tarmac
FFWD F5R + F5C tubular on my Specialized Tarmac
Zipp 808 + Zipp 900 disc tubular on my Scott Plasma 2
Novatec 30 Disc tubeless (OEM wheels on Felt F4x)

First impressions:
If you want to make a cyclocross bike fast on the road, these wheels are a solution. In general I think that every bike build has a certain ”structural velocity”, which I mean speed that is relatively easy to maintain. These wheels definetly improve that. I’m not going to disclose any speeds as they are always relative to the route and conditions, but I’m leaning towards these being on par or even a little faster than my Tarmac on the EC90s. This was a very casual ride and I wasn’t hunting KOM’s or anything like that, but the potential was there to be felt.

There is something in the front end handling I don’t like. The bike feels hesitant to lean into a corner. I suspect it’s either the front tire’s shape (as it is so bowed out) which is making the transition from center tread to the tread’s side feel laborsome, or it’s just the tire’s width which is adding inertia. It would be interesting to throw a 28mm tire on the front wheel and see whether that makes it worse or not. I didn’t try any serious sprints, just a couple of short efforts over rolling hills. Through those efforts the wheels felt very solid and on point.

So far the KCNC Razor discs do not seem suitable for prolonged braking. I didn’t make adjustments to the brake calipers when changing wheels which could help things, as they didn’t rub. The braking feel is quite close to how the discs look like - quite a lot of air between the pads and not much material to hold on to. Braking feels like the pads are hitting the edges in the discs continously, and the edges may be chipping material away from the pads. That could be remedied by sanding the leading edges of the pads to an angle, but I’m not fussed enough to go through that.

It may just be the general feeling of 25mm to 28mm tubeless road tires, but so far I’m not a fan of the riding feel of the Schwalbe Pro Ones. There is this distinct vagueness in them. I prefer the planted and more direct feel of 22-24mm tubulars. Then again my favourite tubular of all time has been the Schwalbe One, so I think Schwalbe knows how to manufacture tires with good riding feel. On less than ideal road surfaces, a certain level of ”disconnect” may be very welcome.