Xentis wheels - Squad 5.8 carbon clincher

pinkbikini

Does anyone have any experience of Xentis Squad wheels, specifically the 5.8 carbon clincher? Thinking about options for continued racing - I have Mavic Cosmic Carbones but they are a bit heavy and I find them a bit too flexy, even after tweaking. I'm quite a large rider (80-ish kilos). They'll be used for road racing and some of the more boring crit circuits.

Also, any opinions or experience of starbike.com (German outfit)? Obviously I'll be contacting them to see what I think myself, but any info would be useful.

Any good alternatives (clincher)? I should state that I'm a bike tart and looks are of key importance!

Thanks

(Not interested in tubs, opinions on tubs, questions regarding whether I have considered tubs, etc, etc!!!)

joeyhalloran

have you considered tubs?


Sorry, I couldn't resist, but I am also gonna keep an eye on the answers to this thread.

Anonymous

Lots of good words said about Edge Carbon Clinchers (now Enve), they may well be worth a look.

Reynolds also do some pretty good value carbon clinchers, not sure how stiff they are though.

Zipp have brought some out too.

Oh, and Tune!!

pinkbikini

Bump.

Bueller...anyone...?

pinkbikini

Oh well...
JoeyHalloran, don't hold your breath for advice from this thread!
NapD, thanks for the comments - Reynolds don't appeal at either price point, Enve and Zipp are just too expensive, Tune are basically built on Xentis deep section rims AFAIK.
If I get them (big if) I'll report on how they ride.

pinkbikini

Well, I got them and they went back without being used.

The Squad 5.8 clincher look visually pretty good overall. NIce carbon weave for the main deep section surface looks classy. Weight came in within a few grammes of manufacturer stated weight. Finishing around the clincher edge is a little rough but since you don't see it when a tyre is fitted that wouldn't have bothered me. What did bother me was that I couldn't fit a clincher tyre to these wheels! Using fingers and brute force (and lots of talc) I managed to get a GP4000s bead (which I use on all my wheels) to within about 35cm of being on the wheel on one side only. This was with the thinnest rim ribbon fitted. I didn't go down the route of using tyre levers to struggle further as I didn't want to knacker the rim and be unable to send the wheels back. Suffice to say that, having fitted loads of tyres to wheels, if I cannot get at least a foot of tyre bead over the clincher edge in a warm room then I know I won't have a hope on the road.

So, nice looking wheels but ultimately a bit hopeless. I could have been unlucky and got a duff set I suppose :?

The tub version of these would probably be fine if that's your thing.

Good service generally from starbike.com in Germany.

Now exploring alternatives again.

Monty Dog

^ should have bought tubs :?
If your struggling with tyre fit try a Vittoria EVO or Veloflex open tubular - more worthy of your wheels and your Contis will feel wooden in comparison