Wheel recommendations for cyclocross

juppa

Hi everyone!

My Kona Jake's (2014) stock wheelset has served me quite nicely but now the rear one took some serious damage, so I'm about to get some new wheelset. I'm an amateur competitive road cyclist and as a college student with not too much money hanging around, my road bike is my priority.

I use my cyclocross for everyday commuting and winter training and also for autumn's local cyclocross races.

I would be very thankful if you could give me some recommendations of budget CX wheelsets. I'm not very familiar with disc brakes, so if my current wheels are mounted with 6 bolt discs, how do I have to take this on account on new wheelset? My current discs are in good shape so they wouldn't need replacement.

Cheers

bendertherobot

Budget? I'd be looking at Wiggle's Cosine Disc, Fulcrum Racing 5 LG and the Pro Lite Revo.

As to the latter, ask Wiggle to price match Ribble. SOmetimes works, sometimes does not.

juppa

Budget would be around 200-300e. Thank you, those wheels look pretty nice.

Cosine and fulcrum you mentioned are not specificially cyclocross wheels, are they? But reading the reviews it seems that they would do ok for CX courses, too. What is the main difference when some wheels are sold as "CX" and some just sells as road wheels but in the description it says road/cx?

timothyw

I seem to recall hearing that CX branded wheels can have better seals to keep water and muck out of the bearings, with the caveat that they then might not roll quite so sweetly.

Another potential difference is the tyre pressure that the rims can accomodate - because CX tyres are run at much lower pressures than road tyres, some CX rims (eg the notubes Iron Cross) are only specced to accomodate 45 psi, so anyone running road tyres on them would obviously be way out of spec and risking a catastrophic failure.

In practice though, I suspect a lot of 'CX' wheelsets are just a road wheelset with 'CX' written on them...

bendertherobot

juppa wrote:

Budget would be around 200-300e. Thank you, those wheels look pretty nice.

Cosine and fulcrum you mentioned are not specificially cyclocross wheels, are they? But reading the reviews it seems that they would do ok for CX courses, too. What is the main difference when some wheels are sold as "CX" and some just sells as road wheels but in the description it says road/cx?

I think the distinction is broadly lost now with discs. It's probably better to have more spokes (so the Pro Lite) but I'd not worry unduly unless you're really heavy.

juppa

Yeah, better sealed hubs makes sense in CX wheels. Funny thing, I tried Wiggle's chat and the guy first recommended Campys Scirocco's (http://www.wiggle.co.uk/campagnolo-scir ... -wheelset/) but then backed off the situation and told me that unfortunately he was wrong and there are no CX wheels currently on Wiggle !!!??

Anyway those Campy's look pretty decent.

arlowood

juppa wrote:

Yeah, better sealed hubs makes sense in CX wheels. Funny thing, I tried Wiggle's chat and the guy first recommended Campys Scirocco's (http://www.wiggle.co.uk/campagnolo-scir ... -wheelset/) but then backed off the situation and told me that unfortunately he was wrong and there are no CX wheels currently on Wiggle !!!??

Anyway those Campy's look pretty decent.

Unless I'm missing something the Campy Scirocco's are not disc compatible. The hubs appear to be standard road wheel hubs.

They may be claimed as CX or cyclocross wheels but are probably meant for non-disc cyclocross bikes which are now relatively rare beasts.

ravey1981

I've been very happy with my Kinesis crosslights, strong and reasonably light. I'm running them tubeless with cx tyres.