Wheels full of water

twiza

I recently bought a new set of Hunt Aero 50 wheels with tubeless tyres. My second ride with them was RideLondon which was pretty torrential all day. Cleaning my bike the following day I noticed the sound of water sloshing around in both wheels, especially bad in the rear. It seems that most aero wheel have a small hole in the side that allows it to drain with centrifugal force. However Hunt have not installed this feature, and the valve hole is obviously the wrong way up to allow gravity to drain it. Hunt suggest removing the locking ring around the valve, putting in a warm place and letting it evaporate which I've been doing for 2 weeks to no noticeable affect.

Does anyone have any other suggestions to accelerate the water removal and how to prevent it in the first place? Don't want to have to change wheels every time it rains and I don't fancy drilling holes in £1000 wheels!!

fenix

Not sure if I'm reading this wrong - but if you have the holes - then rotate the wheel until its at the bottom and watch the water dribble out.

Aaah - i think you missed out 'not'

If you haven't got them then you're screwed. Personally I'd be taking the tube out and draining it like that.

YOu do wonder about the benefits of aero wheels if they're sloshing lots of water inside them - maybe it happens with all wheels but we don't notice.

twiza

Apologies, you're quite right about the 'not', now added!

I have thought about removing the tyre, but its a tubeless set up so not quite that easy with sealant and valve to remove.

Agree with you about the questionable benefits, I hadn't considered water ingress but it must make my nice light wheels at least a bit heavier

janwal

I had a similar water problem a short time ago with my DTSwiss R32 Wheelspin. My tubeless rear wheel went down overnight after checking and topping up the sealant. In the end I pumped it up and dipped the wheel in a bowl of water. Turns out air was leaking from the valve ,it just needed a tweak to tighten it up. However as I put it back on I heard the water swishing around in the rim in the gap between the inter and outer rim. It had got in down the space between the spoke and the rim. As I was wondering how to get it out I had let out some air and by coincidence compressed the tyre leaning on it this must have altered the pressure in the rim space and a lot of water came up out of the lowest spokes. So I did this a few times and luckily got most of it out.Hope that makes sense.

twiza

Interesting that it got into the tyre, I haven't removed it yet but had been assured by Hunt that it couldn't get in. I guess if its properly sealed then the air pressure should prevent it whilst inflated. Wheels still sat in the sun!

keef66

Both my cheap alu Shimano wheelsets have drain holes. If I've been out on a wet ride and remember to rotate the wheels so they are at the bottom a surprising amount of water can drain out, so I'm guessing a 50mm rim could hold significantly more. Bizarre omission by Hunt I think.

Matthewfalle

just drill a hole in it.

rwoofer

My Mavic Cosmic Pro Carbons were also full of water after the Ride100. Lots of vigorous shqking with the tyres off was the only way i could get rid of it.

CitizenLee

Put them in a giant tub of dry rice

N0bodyOfTheGoat

Think how much quicker you will be next summer when your wheels are dry and lighter.

fenix

Got it ! Microwave the water out of them.

You can thank me later.

Matthewfalle

tie them to a kite and fly them cloee to the sun - close enough to warm up and dry them out but not close enough to melt them

#icarus

cooldad

Don't worry, they'll dissolve soon, water does that to CF. I read it on the internet.

Matthewfalle

cooldad wrote:

Don't worry, they'll dissolve soon, water does that to CF. I read it on the internet.

shhhh! you'll get called a troll for posting something that is actually true.

#suppressthetruth

twiza

Good ideas Matthew, getting my hammer drill charged now!

twiza

By way of an update, I found that I could get some water out by removing the valve locking nut and shaking the wheels lots with the valve at the bottom. Very slow but seemed to get quite a lot of water out.

Also if there is direct sunlight, it heats the wheels and water. With the valve at the top of the wheel the water seems to condense on the valve and slowly drip out.

Can still hear a small amount in the wheels which is very irritating but don't think its enough to affect performance. Just a shame Hunt didn't pre empt this with a drain hole

keef66

Sounds like a proper faff. I'd still be drilling a small drain hole myself. Unless you're only going to ride them in future if the forecast is warm and dry?

twiza

keef66 wrote:

Sounds like a proper faff. I'd still be drilling a small drain hole myself. Unless you're only going to ride them in future if the forecast is warm and dry?

Agreed. I'm very tempted, but very difficult to work out exactly where to drill, if its not right at the bottom of the section then water won't drain, too low and I'll be damaging the wall that the tubeless tape sits on. Obviously be invalidating the warranty and no idea what carbon is like to drill through, will it crack or flake?

keef66

Carbon is pretty easy to drill / saw. Use a new, sharp wood bit. A Dremel will be easier to use accurately than a cordless drill for the tiny hole you'd need.

But yes, I'd want to be pretty sure of the internal profile of the rim first, and in the absence of a drawing from Hunt the valve hole is the only place you can really peer inside. Which on a tubeless setup is a bit of a pain in the @rse...

Wonder why they don't do drain holes? Who wants a 3kg aero wheelset??