amp wheels, anyone used them?

blinddrew

Thinking about upgrading my wheels and came across these folks: http://www.amphoops.com/
London based, £700 for a 1540g set of clinchers with skewers and pads seemed pretty reasonable.
Anyone else used them? Avoided them?

ugo.santalucia

I quote


"The better you look, the faster you go. We don’t have the scientific paper to hand, but we’re pretty adamant that’s the truth. That’s why you now have three different designs to choose from, so you can build some serious style into your steed. If you need’em bare for team or sponsorship reasons, just get in touch and we can put them together for you.

Specification:

Front Hub: amp Superlight, black anodized, 20 hole, 100mm spacing, sealed cartridge bearings
Rear Hub: amp Superlight, black anodized, 24 hole, 130mm spacing, sealed cartridge bearings. Available in all cassette compatibilites.
Rim: 20/24 hole 38mm structural carbon clincher
Spokes: amp Race Blades (double-butted black aero). Front 20 spoke radial lace, rear 24 spoke 2-cross (DS) radial (NDS) lace
Weight: 647g (F), 798g (R), 1445g (set)"

Now I translate:

the first statement is utter rubbish and doesn't need commenting... the better you look the faster you go? Who is going to explain that to the average ugly Mamil?

Second part: none of the components has any quality claim... basically they say: trust us, we will select the best components for you: this typically means cheap chinese rims and cheap taiwanese hubs, laced together with poor quality bladed spokes.
With the same money you can get rims and spokes with a name (Gigantex + Sapim for instance) and hubs that are not ashamed to carry a label on. Most of these taiwanese hubs are little more than disposable.

So that's my take, which means, I know nothing about these wheels, but I would be weary to part from 700 pounds based on their claims.
My advice is talk to Wheelsmith and see what you can get for the same money.

blinddrew

Cheers Ugo, I did look at the Wheelsmith site but really couldn't see anything in my budget (plus I was struggling a bit to make sense of their website - that could do with some work!)
Wiggle are doing some Campag Bullet Ultras for just a bit more at the moment so that would appear to be a better bet.

ugo.santalucia

blinddrew wrote:

Cheers Ugo, I did look at the Wheelsmith site but really couldn't see anything in my budget (plus I was struggling a bit to make sense of their website - that could do with some work!)
Wiggle are doing some Campag Bullet Ultras for just a bit more at the moment so that would appear to be a better bet.

Different concept though... alloy/carbon rims, somewhat heavier, although they don't have the drawbacks of full carbon clincher rims.
As all Mavic/Campagnolo/Fulcrum/Shimano wheels you will have the issue of proprietary parts, meaning they cannot be repaired with standard parts and the availability of spares is patchy and the cost often prohibitive... barring all that, Campagnolo wheels are generally well assembled and the hubs are first class

blinddrew

the bullets and bullet ultras seem to be a mix of carbon/alloy hybrids and carbon with alloy braking surfaces depending on which variant you're looking at. Have to say that campag's wheel designation and product set isn't the clearest.
Might give wheelsmith a call and see if he / they can clarify their website a bit.
Cheers

ugo.santalucia

blinddrew wrote:

the bullets and bullet ultras seem to be a mix of carbon/alloy hybrids and carbon with alloy braking surfaces depending on which variant you're looking at. Have to say that campag's wheel designation and product set isn't the clearest.
Might give wheelsmith a call and see if he / they can clarify their website a bit.
Cheers

As you have not mentioned looks, You might even want to ask yourself why on earth you want carbon clinchers... they have virtually no benefit other than exposing more surface to side winds and allowing for bigger stickers. The best aerodynamic wheels, outside your price range, will save you around 10-15 Watt when you are putting down 400. I have an aerobic threshold of 280 Watt or so, not entirely sure what benefit I will get out these things to be honest... 700 quid to get some cheap Chinese components and an alleged 2% advantage in the Disney World of wind tunnels... mmmhhh :?
700 is a lot of money and could buy you some pretty good stuff in the NON-composite market

blinddrew

Interesting, out of curiosity what would you go for? I've seen things like the Dura-ace c24s occasionally popping up for that price, which give a big old weight advantage over my current wheels - as do the above wheels for that matter. I'm pretty certain that I don't put out anything close to 400W but I would expect any aero benefits to scale albeit as an inverse square with a corresponding reduction in speed.

blinddrew

blinddrew wrote:

Cheers Ugo, I did look at the Wheelsmith site but really couldn't see anything in my budget (plus I was struggling a bit to make sense of their website - that could do with some work!)

Now looked at their site on a more modern browser and can make a bit more sense of it, looks like the place to start, thanks for the tip.