Best wheelset under £200

daddy0

Due to buying a house, having second kid and wife not going back to work I'm on a very tight budget.

Have been riding Fulcrum 5s and they've been great for me. Been lusting after some Campag Zondas for a while but just don't have the spare cash to splash ATM. Suggestions gratefully recieved.

Thanks!

alanparsons

Zonda's £250
Scirocco 35 £170
Fulcrum Quattro's £203
All at wiggle.

passout

I got these & like them, Merlin have put a link to a review on there too I think. Pretty stiff wheels: http://www.merlincycles.com/forza-cirru ... 72600.html

holiver

The newer Fulcrum Racing 5 LG with a wider rim can be had for £200 at Merlin.

jordan_217

I'm sorry to be *that* person but I'd seriously consider handbuilts. I bought these from the Cycle Clinic and they shame the Mavic Ksyrium Elites that they replaced:

http://thecycleclinic.co.uk/collections ... 9-wheelset

They are very well built, stiff wheels that have durable and trouble free hubs (Miche Primato); perfect for my needs. Very nice for racing on too as there's no flex in them at all.

I'd consider speaking to Malcolm and seeing what he can supply within your budget.

ugo.santalucia

jordan_217 wrote:

I'd consider speaking to Malcolm and seeing what he can supply within your budget.

Hand builts < 200 is a bit of a no-go area to be honest. It's hard to build anything decent without compromises.

IMO 250-500 pounds is the range where alloy hand builts make sense as an upgrade. Below quality suffers and above is vanity.

jordan_217

ugo.santalucia wrote:

jordan_217 wrote:

I'd consider speaking to Malcolm and seeing what he can supply within your budget.

Hand builts < 200 is a bit of a no-go area to be honest. It's hard to build anything decent without compromises.

IMO 250-500 pounds is the range where alloy hand builts make sense as an upgrade. Below quality suffers and above is vanity.

Really? Well OP, spend the extra £50!

dave35

passout wrote:

I got these & like them, Merlin have put a link to a review on there too I think. Pretty stiff wheels: http://www.merlincycles.com/forza-cirru ... 72600.html

Tempted with a pair of these aswell, how strong are they considering their weight, choice of these or fulcrum racing 5lg for the same price.

dinyull

Daddy0 wrote:

Due to buying a house, having second kid and wife not going back to work I'm on a very tight budget.

Have been riding Fulcrum 5s and they've been great for me. Been lusting after some Campag Zondas for a while but just don't have the spare cash to splash ATM. Suggestions gratefully recieved.

Thanks!

Check 4thebike.de, a German website but Chrome of Firefox will translate.

I got a bargain just over a year ago with some Mavic Cosmic Elite for £180 instead of £350 and having had a quick look - Askium's for £100, Racing 5 for £140 and Quatro's for £170.

Top service too.

passout

Dave 35-

Seem good, no issues & stiff (which is what I wanted with these). However they are quite new and one my summer bike so only done a handful of rides. The reviews I saw suggested that they were pretty tough. For the money I don't think you can wrong. I'd get them unless you after the wider rims of the fulcrums you mentioned.

dave35

Thanks, use my wheels mainly for commuting,100 miles a week on average but still manage a longish ride on my days off so something a bit better/lighter than the stock cxp22 rims and felt hubs I've got now. Don't want to spend more than £220 but that includes £70 I'm flogging my other wheels for.

wotnoshoeseh

Dinyull wrote:

Check 4thebike.de, a German website but Chrome of Firefox will translate.

I got a bargain just over a year ago with some Mavic Cosmic Elite for £180 instead of £350 and having had a quick look - Askium's for £100, Racing 5 for £140 and Quatro's for £170.

Top service too.

+1 for 4thebike.de . I got pair of Ksyrium Elites WTS just over a year ago for ~320 quid delivered.
Cheap Euro has got to help too at the minute!!

badgermilk

Buy a nearly new set of branded wheels from someone who has taken them off a brand new bike to upgrade.
I bought a set of Giant PSL-1 wheels on ebay for £63. Decent wheels that have DT Swiss hubs and weigh just over 1kg for the rear and 700g for the front!

daddy0

Cheers for the tips fellas! I may well go for some Fulcrum 5s from 4thebike.de - what are their delivery costs and lead times like?

MisterGibbo

I'm new to road cycling myself, I've been researching a lot of wheels probably from £200-£300. I really like the look of the Zondas mentioned earlier, however I really recommend you take a look at the Pave 28 Ultras by Superstar Components for £195.

There's not too much around on the net about them as you can only buy direct from the supplier, however the reviews seem extremely positive indeed.

http://www.superstarcomponents.com/en/p ... t-2024.htm

(I shall point out I haven't yet ridden them, so do take what I say with a pinch of salt!)

dinyull

Daddy0 wrote:

Cheers for the tips fellas! I may well go for some Fulcrum 5s from 4thebike.de - what are their delivery costs and lead times like?

I ordered in the lead up to Christmas so was expecting a bit of a delay but they arrived within 3-5 days and I'm almost certain it was free delivery.

Another German site to consider is Bike 24.

ugo.santalucia

MisterGibbo wrote:

I'm new to road cycling myself... I really recommend...
(I shall point out I haven't yet ridden them, so do take what I say with a pinch of salt!)

:roll:

stevie63

First poster bigging up Superstar, could they be up to their old ways.

lakesluddite

Daddy0 wrote:

Cheers for the tips fellas! I may well go for some Fulcrum 5s from 4thebike.de - what are their delivery costs and lead times like?

My Krysiums cost 10Euros for delivery, but I had to wait an age for them - they were apparently out of stock, but it took them ages to tell me that. It wasn't a problem for me as I am still to receive the frame they're going on, but beware it MIGHT be a bit longer than UK based onlilne retailers.

PS - Their website translates to English at the click of a (Union Flag) button, and they've just updated it.

passout

There are also these http://www.merlincycles.com/supra-ra30- ... 57767.html

I think they are the in house brand of Sensa bikes. Never tried them but they are very keenly priced.

MisterGibbo

Well I shall thank you for the warm welcome later :oops:

Apologies, I can see that must have looked like a rather daft first post. What do you mean about Superstar 'back to their old ways?'

My phrasing wasn't great, to the OP I merely meant to say that I've spent a lot of time myself researching with a similar budget and for me felt that the Superstars appeared worth looking into.

Here's to a better third post!

vermin

Cero AR24

http://www.cycledivision.co.uk/product- ... id363.html

passout

vermin wrote:

Cero AR24

http://www.cycledivision.co.uk/product- ... id363.html

These look good.

MisterMuncher

badgermilk wrote:

Buy a nearly new set of branded wheels from someone who has taken them off a brand new bike to upgrade.
I bought a set of Giant PSL-1 wheels on ebay for £63. Decent wheels that have DT Swiss hubs and weigh just over 1kg for the rear and 700g for the front!

This, simply because your budget won't quite accommodate handbuilts. RS-10s, Askiums, Racing 7s and 5s all crop up in this sort of range. Try asking in your LBS or watching outlet sellers from the big online retailers on ebay.

paxington

Daddy0 wrote:

Due to buying a house, having second kid and wife not going back to work I'm on a very tight budget.

Have been riding Fulcrum 5s and they've been great for me. Been lusting after some Campag Zondas for a while but just don't have the spare cash to splash ATM. Suggestions gratefully recieved.

Thanks!

Why are you wanting to replace the fulcrums ? Under £200 at RRP I don't think you're likely to get anything that will offer any performance advantage over them.
That said, the above post from MisterMuncher and the post he quotes from Badgermilk offer some good avenues to investigate if you do need to replace your wheels for reasons other than a performance upgrade.

jswba

MisterGibbo wrote:

I'm new to road cycling myself, I've been researching a lot of wheels probably from £200-£300. I really like the look of the Zondas mentioned earlier, however I really recommend you take a look at the Pave 28 Ultras by Superstar Components for £195.

There's not too much around on the net about them as you can only buy direct from the supplier, however the reviews seem extremely positive indeed.

http://www.superstarcomponents.com/en/p ... t-2024.htm

(I shall point out I haven't yet ridden them, so do take what I say with a pinch of salt!)

Uh-oh. Could this be the start of another 26 pager?

paxington

Daddy0 wrote:

Due to buying a house, having second kid and wife not going back to work I'm on a very tight budget.

Have been riding Fulcrum 5s and they've been great for me. Been lusting after some Campag Zondas for a while but just don't have the spare cash to splash ATM. Suggestions gratefully recieved.

Thanks!

BTW what became of the Prolite Braccianos? in the picture in the link to your Felt 5. I had a set of those for £218 on offer from CRC a couple of years ago. Might be worth seeing if they're doing any similar offers at the moment.

norvernrob

If you're anywhere near Sheffield my mate has just advertised some Zondas, he got them last summer so have done around 1500 miles. They've got GP4000s tyres on and I think he wants £170 for them.

daddy0

The Prolites didn't last very long. The front rim got destroyed by a pothole and the rear went out of true. I never really got on with them either, I'm not a particularly heavy rider at about 75kg, but noticed them flexing under my powerawesome all the time so didn't bother fixing them. On paper they looked great, and the reviews I read seemed favourable, but they just didn't live up to the hype. And its for this reason why I'm after opinions of people who have actually used the wheels they're suggesting ;-)

The Fulcrum 5s are probably worn beyond being safe, although TBH I have no idea if this is true. I've ridden through 2 winters and covered about 16000km on them, mostly commuting, all weathers. I've not taken the best care of them either. Goodness knows how many brake blocks I've been through, replaced the bearings at least twice. Great wheels though, no flex, spin for ages (depending on bearings of course, factory ones were good) and have never gone out of true! They're probably ready to be retired though, right?

You guys have made me think I should probably buy a tool for checking the rim thickness on the 5s - any suggestions regarding this?

Nowhere near Sheffield I'm afraid, I'm a Kent lad.

paxington

Totally agree about getting feedback from people who've actually used the wheels they're recommending. That said I guess another pair of Fulcrum 5's makes sense if they're in budget and yours really are dead.
Merlin cycles do them under £200 for (I believe)the wider rimmed one's and £150 ish for previous models. They've also got Mavic Aksiums for £149 with tyres and very little less money without tyres. I've heard they're solid wheels but never used them myself.

ugo.santalucia

Daddy0 wrote:

You guys have made me think I should probably buy a tool for checking the rim thickness on the 5s - any suggestions regarding this?

You need a decent vernier caliper and two lengths of a known quality. By that I mean two small pieces of something you can lean against the inside and outside of the rim, knowing exactly how thick they are. You measure the total width, and subtract the known quality and here's your rim thickness. 0.9 mm or less throw them away.
I normally use segments of a 2 mm plain gauge spoke.