Best wheelset for £4-450

Jauncarlos67

I am considering upgrading my wheels, my budget is £4-450, I'm around 98kg.
My current wheels are Mavic Askiums.

Any suggestions would be appreciated, thanks

EKIMIKE

Not again.

EKIMIKE

Pre-determined/guaranteed responses:

Mavic Ksyrium Elite
+1 They're the best wheels ever.

Handbuilt (General)
+1 *lecture about handbuilts*

Handbuilt by Wheelsmith
+1 He built some wheels for me

Handbuilt by ugo.santalucia
+1 He built some wheels for me

EKIMIKE

Oh and someone will ask whether you're fat or just a big bloke. (not sure what difference it makes?)

Jauncarlos67

I'd prefer to say cute and cuddly, some jealous types may say fat

EKIMIKE

I fully intend to embellish this thread so that no-one else need respond. It is my pleasure.

If you go for handbuilts you will probably be recommended a high spoke count Novatec/H Plus Son Archetype combination. Wheelsmith do something similar called Race23 but with lighter hubs. You'll probably be pointed in the direction of a higher spoke count than the standard 20/24 offering.

Scrumple

Wagon Wheels.

EKIMIKE

Right now, someone would say this:

"Don't bother with handbuilt just go for Mavic Ksyrium Elite they're tops" and use a silly term that means nothing, like "tops".

EKIMIKE

Then ugo.santalucia will diplomatically agree that Ksyrium Elite's are fine but then eloquently seduce you into choosing a tasty set of handbuilts.

(F**K YOU SCRUMPLE, F**K YOU)

16mm

EKIMIKE wrote:

Right now, someone would say this:

"Don't bother with handbuilt just go for Mavic Ksyrium Elite they're tops" and use a silly term that means nothing, like "tops".

yeah, Mavic Ksyrium Elite are the t1ts.

EKIMIKE

It's been said mate. You needn't have bothered.

Coach H

This time last year got some Ksyrium Elites which are perfectly good and look quite flash

Ugo offered to build me some handbuilts for the same type of spec at 2/3 of the price, which could be serviced but would look different to the Mavics. I thanked him but turned him down (for accepted vanity reasons :roll: )

If I had my time again, for this money, I would have Ugo build me some H Plus Son TB14's (Old School look shallow clinchers) on Novatec hubs (Campag Record or Dura Ace maybe for extra £'s depending on your preference)

The Mavics are great (light and stiff) and I got them at a good price (pre-model change) and I will continue to think they are great unless I have a rim or spoke incident then I will wish I went handbuilt.

As Ugo correctly comented at the time; most people will prefer the LOOKS of bladed, low spoke count wheels with their large tubed carbon bike. This does not make them wheels better suited to the task

bmxboy10

love it

Scrumple

Hamster wheels

Barteos

32H wheels are so last century. 20/24 wheels are the way to go. Even better if you find something like 6/10. The fewer spokes the better.
It doesn't matter that your ride will be over, when only a single spoke breaks when you hit one of the many potholes. What matters is that your average speed could go up by at least 0.01mph...
You know ... the aero benefit and (rotating) weight savings of several grams make all the difference...

The fancier and more proprietary design the faster the wheels are going to be. You can't argue with marketing guys. Their know their stuff. The replacement parts will be expensive, difficult or impossible to get quickly (especially after a few years time) but as it's only a few hundred quid you can always upgrade to another stiffer lighter smoother and more aero model which will make you even faster. In fact by upgrading every year you wouldn't have to train at all.

Avoid hand built wheels if possible as they are heavy, flexible, look ugly and will reduce your average speed by at least 2mph... They also don't roll as smoothly... I don't know what it means exactly but it's important.

The worst option for you would be a pair of Hope Pro3/Open Pro wheels. They are made by this dodgy company catering for hairy mountain bikers so they are usually not recommended often on road forums. You know... it's not a proper brand to be seen on a road bike. Their freehubs are loud which is a big problem for those who spend more time coasting than pedalling.

Wirral_paul

Its amazing how much effort goes into providing a totally unhelpful answer to a question. If the question annoys someone so much that you feel the need to write an essay to suggest "do a search" or to be a smart arse by jumping on the bandwagon - then why not be more helpful and just move on to the next thread without posting??

Maybe the Forum Administrators should just lock the whole forum and put a great big sticky at the top of each section saying "do a search" and save you all the trouble.

Beatmaker

If it was my money, it would be spent on a set of Wheelsmith Race 23's. They are light, ride well, are repairable and spares are easy to source.

smidsy

But seeing as the OP has been a member for 6 months or so you would expect that he has read the other 372 posts asking the same thing?

Anyway in the spirit of added value IMO the best wheels for £450 are ones that are suited to your requirements, can be easily serviced, made of components that are readily avaialable, can be repaired easily and cost effectively.

I'll leave you to deduce what that us. :-)

pkripper

get whichever ones make your bike look the pimpest

16mm

Useful answer. I has £450 to get some wheels. I spent £200 on some Campag Siroccos. They're still straight and smooth, and I'm +/-0.000001kph faster than the stock MicroTech wheels, and I spend the extra £250 on some crap I can't remember.

Jauncarlos67

smidsy your absolutely right, I could have looked at the "372" posts.....
However I decided to ask for advance based on my weight/budget etc.

I clearly wrote in the title wheels bla bla
so any one who felt this was a repetitive question needn't have answered, unless of course all they want to do is spend time either taking the p*%s, or have nothing else to do.

Thanks to all once again

smidsy

Jauncarlos67 wrote:

I clearly wrote in the title wheels bla bla

Errr....nope, not that clearly :?

Anyway at 98kg I would certainly recommend staying clear of low spoke count wheelsets. 32 spokes or better IMO.

16mm

smidsy wrote:

Jauncarlos67 wrote:

I clearly wrote in the title wheels bla bla

Errr....nope, not that clearly :?

Anyway at 98kg I would certainly recommend staying clear of low spoke count wheelsets. 32 spokes or better IMO.

At nearly 100kg I'd look for rims that will run 25s or 28s happily. I'm 89kg and run 32s, 28 and 25's. Steer clear of race wheels for whippets, you'll want a bit of mass.

ugo.santalucia

Yes, in that weight range if you want something reliable it is bound to be closer to 2 Kg than to 1.5. If you want something light, then it is bound not to be reliable, of course...

Then there is always some lucky one who gets away with a 1450 grams wheelset and never experiences any problem, but the web is full of people saying one thing and others saying the opposite and it is difficult to discriminate between those who are credible from those who are not, hiding behind an avatar.
If you don't want to take risks, you have to have a healthy spoke count on your rear wheel, 28 being the very minimum and only viable with some rims, more generally 32.
Some will tell you 32 is boring and I still don't understand why 8 spokes more than the market rate are more boring than 8 spokes less... maybe spokes are inherently boring, in which case a disc wheel with no spokes might be the answer...

Anyway, the market offers very little in terms of decent wheelsets for heavier riders, busy as they are catering for kids, anorexics and wannabe Contador with smaller engines and even smaller cojones.
If you want to spend that money, talk to a builder, if you don't want the hassle of having to talk to someone and prefer coloured nipples and flat spokes, then go for a factory wheelset, Mavic Ksyrium Elite being the least worst of the lot and the most likely to offer you what you are looking for. With Mavic there is the usual palaver with spare parts, but you can read the lowdown on another thread, no need to go on about it yet again

good luck

smidsy

ugo.santalucia wrote:

Mavic Ksyrium Elite being the least worst of the lot

Now that is the best description I have seen for these

dwanes

Get some Water Wheels, they generate power, more power faster you go.

Barteos

Jauncarlos67

Ok, my previous post may look like some trolling but it isn't. When you strip it from sarcasm you'll get a good picture of what to get and what not to and why certain wheels are popular while some aren't.

Get a pair of Hope3/Open Pro hoops and be done with it. They will be bombproof and if something goes wrong they are easily and cheaply rebuildable with standard parts. The hubs themselves will make a good investment.
Get 25mm or 28mm tyres to go with it as 23mm width will offer you no benefits whatsoever.

A few hundred grams of difference between wheels (most of which isn't even in the rims) rotating or not, will make absolutely NO meaningful difference to your average speed (climbing or not).
It's been shown that the effect of rotating mass that so many people obsess about is negligible when you take into account the weight of yourself and the bike. What people "feel" simply doesn't translate to actual performance gains.

fluff.

Barteos wrote:

Get a pair of Hope3/Open Pro hoops and be done with it. They will be bombproof.....

Can't believe it took this long for the b word to appear.

EKIMIKE

Oh crikey, how did i miss the b word?!

Scrumple

Ferris wheels