Farsports 27.5" Tubeless Crater Wheels for Gravel Bike - Review

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drcgriffith
Posts: 7
Joined: Fri Jan 15, 2016 3:41 pm

by drcgriffith

Hi everyone,
Here's a review I wrote of my Farsports 27.5"/650b tubeless wheelset with Schwalbe G One Speed tyres for my gravel bike (GR030 frame):

Farsports 27.5” Crater Wheels Review


• Rims: Farsports AM27H30C40 – 30mm deep 40mm wide tubeless disc-specific carbon rims.
• Hubs: DTSwiss 350 straight pull centre lock hubs
• Spokes: Sapim race
• Usage: gravel bike: fast riding on rough Scottish Roads; some gravel.

Website: https://oem.farsports.cn https://www.wheelsfar.com/
Contact: Sandy Xiao – sandy@farsports.cn

I've used Farsports wheels for 6 years now, the relationship with this brand developing from regular customer to manager of a Farsports-sponsored team. These are wheels I have purchased myself (with team discount) for personal use.

Purchasing

Purchasing is a simple process, but usually takes a few emails back and forth with Sandy whilst I make my mind up on a purchase! There is a direct web store at https://www.wheelsfar.com/ but personally I've never used this. Once you've decided on a wheelset, a proforma invoice is sent and payment is required before wheels go to production. I've found using the Transferwise service to be a handy way of paying the best exchange rate.

Delivery

Delivery usually takes around 3-4 weeks after payment. There will invariably be a customs charge to pay; this has always been £35-£45 per box for me.

The wheelset will arrive, securely packaged (I've had around 20 wheelsets delivered to me over the past few years without any damage in transit) in a box like this:
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Weight

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Front wheel (with tubeless valve): 732g

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Rear wheel (with tubeless valve): 871g


Wheelset weight: 1603g

For a tubeless wheelset with such wide rims and built with hubs for strength and value rather than ultimate performance, I was very pleasantly surprised by wheelset weight. These are over 400g lighter for the set than the much narrower alloy rims they replaced.

Performance

I chose the 40mm rim width so they would transition nicely with 40mm tyres and the rims indeed do so:
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(front with 40mm Schwalbe G One Speed)

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(rear with 50mm Schwalbe G One Speed)

This is my first performance disc brake wheelset and in summary I'm astonished! Paired with the incredible Schwalbe G One Speed tyres (claimed to be their fastest production tyres – faster than the pro one road tyres) my gravel bike feels as fast or faster than my summer race bike! The wide tyres glide over the horrendous Scottish roads and roll exceptionally quickly. I've done team training rides at race pace (around 27mph average on the flat) and have had no difficulty in maintaining speed and feel I have a definite advantage over the rough stuff. The results of some roller tests with a power meter and speed sensor show a massive 50-60w power saving at 30mph over WTB Horizon 47c tyres and the rolling resistance with 60psi front/55psi rear is virtually identical to my 88mm wheels with 23/25mm Schwalbe Pro one tyres at 90psi(I’ve found 50/45psi to be fast and give a good level of comfort):

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27.5” wheels 40/50mm 60/55psi

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80mm 700c wheels 23/25mm 90/90psi

I've used the wheels on training rides for several hundred miles so far in typically Scottish Winter/Spring conditions and they remain true with bearings smooth. The crater wheelsets are made using formed rather than drilled spoke holes so this should add to wheel strength and durability.

Summary

I’m extremely happy with my purchase of this 27.5mm tubeless wheelset and definitely consider my gravel bike to be the most ‘fun’ to ride. It is now my 'go-to' training bike. So impressed with the performance of the bike with this tyre and wheel setup I'm planning on using the bike in circuit races and road races with rougher surfaces.

David.

Here's the bike:

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by Weenie


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Gary71
Posts: 267
Joined: Wed Aug 21, 2013 5:25 am
Location: Brisbane Australia

by Gary71

Thanks for the write up David.

spdntrxi
Posts: 5792
Joined: Sat Jul 20, 2013 6:11 pm

by spdntrxi

nice... I like it.

just dont believe the G1speeds are faster then pro-one road.. for me they are slower and I compared 28c (pro-one) to 30c (gspeeds) Interesting they are that much faster then WTB though.. since I'm using Byways (which are not that different then horizons ) hope you adjusted for wheel dia for those speed calcs.
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TheKaiser
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Joined: Thu Sep 05, 2013 3:29 pm

by TheKaiser

spdntrxi wrote:
Tue Apr 23, 2019 10:27 pm
nice... I like it.

Interesting they are that much faster then WTB though.. since I'm using Byways (which are not that different then horizons
I've pondered how light tread like on these Schwalbes might alter rolling resistance. Conventional wisdom is that tread blocks squirm and eat up energy, and in extreme cases will lead to a rough ride as the tire rolls over all of the tiny bumps that the tread creates on a hard surface. It seems to me though, that if the tread is created not by adding bumps to the exterior of a given layer of rubber, but instead by relieving the rubber in the negative space between tread blocks, then you might reduce the resistance to the casing flexing at the contact patch. Granted, the knobs will still squirm to some degree, but the relationship between the losses associated with the squirm of microknobs like on these Schwalbes, and the possible gains in a more flexible casing due to thinner base layer of rubber, might actually come out favorably for knobs as a method of improving rolling efficiency, when compared to a tire of identical construction and thickness, but with mostly solid rubber as on the WTB Byway.

spdntrxi
Posts: 5792
Joined: Sat Jul 20, 2013 6:11 pm

by spdntrxi

it's been awhile but when I compared 28c pro-one to 30c G-one speed.. the gspeed cost me 25w. This was on flat and climbs in excess of 3mi segments. My WTB cost me 40-45w.. same with my Donnelly MSO in size 650x42.
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drcgriffith
Posts: 7
Joined: Fri Jan 15, 2016 3:41 pm

by drcgriffith

spdntrxi wrote:
Tue Apr 23, 2019 10:27 pm
nice... I like it.

just dont believe the G1speeds are faster then pro-one road.. for me they are slower and I compared 28c (pro-one) to 30c (gspeeds) Interesting they are that much faster then WTB though.. since I'm using Byways (which are not that different then horizons ) hope you adjusted for wheel dia for those speed calcs.
Yes, adjusted for wheel diameters - measured the diameter of the wheels with speed sensors on manually! Definitely very similar effort on the rollers and it's night and day compared to WTB horizon - instantly noticeably so much harder on road and rollers. On smooth fast road can't possibly be faster, but on a rough surface it might well be! Note at tyre pressures I'd ride on rough surface (50/45psi) it was 15w more power to do that speed on the rollers than the pro ones.

farsportssandy
Posts: 116
Joined: Thu Oct 11, 2018 1:51 am

by farsportssandy

The 11 Nov big sale starts today(only two days), all wheelsets from Farsports will have 10% discoutn, just buy from our webshop https://www.wheelsfar.com/

spdntrxi
Posts: 5792
Joined: Sat Jul 20, 2013 6:11 pm

by spdntrxi

I have G1spds in 30c... no way are they faster then their road... it's not close. Now that's off my chest..

40 wide.. holy hell that is nice.
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by Weenie


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jasonh
Posts: 128
Joined: Thu May 26, 2016 6:55 pm

by jasonh

I think what you’ve built, and illustrated here is awesome, and what I expect racing wheels/tires/bikes for pavement and gravel will evolve to in roughly 3 years (+\-1 year).
I’ll bookmark this post to refer to when the time comes. Kudos to you for doing this.
The trend of wider/faster combined with lighter rims w/o the need to handle rim braking forces is congruous to frameset development in the eighties and early nineties. Bigger diameter tubes and thinner walls equals lighter weight, increased stiffness. Just like Cannondale explained repeatedly, during their formative years with aluminum and Columbus did with their MAX tubes.
And now again with wheels.
Although there’s an aero penalty at higher speed due to extra width, there must be a difference from the reduced height.
It also reminds me very much of a MotoGP wheel. Put an even lighter weight 38c slick on there... bombing a descent or tearing up a tight criterium could render game changing performance.

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