Stans Crest Rims on a Cyclocross Bike

Spacedog

Hi,

I've recently picked up a Boardman Cross bike with disc brakes. I love the bike but I'm not that taken with the wheels. They are Mavic rims with some non-branded hubs.

I'm looking for something pretty tough and I'm not to worried about out and out speed.

I am wondering about steeling the Hope Hoops with Crest rims from my 29 hart tail that I am not using a lot at the moment. I'm planning on running them tubeless with 35mm Rapid Rob Tyres.

I will need to swap the front wheel hub conversions out for QRs but I have them somewhere.

Is there any good reason why these wheels wouldn't work?

I was thinking about getting some Stans Iron Cross on hope hubs, when I have saved up a bit, but have seen the new Grail rims that Stans have come out with.... so these could be a good option depending on the price.

I have Stans/Hope on my mountain bikes and love them which is why I'm looking at them for the cross bikes. I really like the way the Hope hubs are bomb proof and can be easily serviced.

If I'm looking at up to £350 what other wheels should I be looking at?

Thanks

ugo.santalucia

In my experience fitting a 700c tyre on a Crest rim is the same level of effort it takes to climb to camp 4 on Everest (that's the South Col, just before the summit push). Iron Cross is the CX specific rim, Crest is a 29er for big MTB tyres.
Alpha 340 takes all tyres, road included.

springtide9

As Ugo stated, fitting tyres on the Stans Crest can be a real pig. I still have a pair with cross tyres on but bought anther pair for the road (hand-builts )

As you already have the wheels... as long as you are careful with tyre choice you'll be OK.

You might get a 28mm road tyre on the rim, but you'll never get it off again. The Mich Mud 2s fit OK on the Crests and I would feel confident removing them while out with plastic tyre levels etc. But from what I've read (and tried), tyre choice can be a problem.

I was tempted by the Iron Cross but these won't run high pressure road tyres,

After research the KINESIS CX DISC CYCLOCROSS are good value, but for a few ££ more I got a pair of hand-built circa £300 for Novatec Hubs/ H plus Son Archetype rims.

I'm very pleased with the Archetype / Novatec for the road... made a huge difference and I'm sure they would be more than up to offroad riding. The only reason I have two sets of wheels - just makes it easier to swap over.

psterdeacon

Hey there. Have to disagree a tad. I race CX on crests. CX tyres go on fine. I've run Vittorias, muchelin muds and Challenge, Shwalbe all go on fine. Mud's seal up nicely tubeless, as do the vittorias, Challenges won't as they've got a fat bead (oooh er). I've also stuck on conti gp4000s 25s. they go on fine too. you just have to make sure you push the bead right into the dip in the middle of the rim as your putting them on- if it's in here you can get them on fine.

novatec do some nice looking new disc wheels, and I hear the new kinesis ones aren't bad either- then there's handbuilts as springtide mentions - you do get a good set of wheels if you go this way.