Cheap Chinese Carbon wheels post Brexit

I've got a Ribble Endurance SL Disk on order. Intention is for it to be my "year round training bike". I have a race bike for when I want something light and snappy. This is specced with 105 and the intention is to have it as a bike that's nice to ride but not too nice that I'd mind chucking in the boot and taking wherever and riding whenever etc.
But it comes with Aksiums, which I know from when I got my Dolan are 2.1kgs of pig iron that kill the feel of any bike. Wanted a pair of cheap mid depth budget carbon clinchers (38 or 50mm, tubeless, thru axle - don't need to be super light).
Originally I had planned to just get a cheap set of Chinese eBay wheels with generic Novatec hubs etc. As disk I am pretty confident they won't melt going downhill. But post Brexit I'm guessing that you're pretty much always guaranteed to be hit with import fees.
So choice to me seems to be:
1. Get some eBay specials at c£330 which by my guesstimate will turn into about £410 once all fees paid
2. Get a cheap UK sourced set like Prime at £560 or Merlin at £500
If the difference is only £90 I would almost certainly go for the UK sourced.
My questions really are:
- does anyone know of a better source of cheap carbon wheels?
- whats the process of calculating / paying import fees so I can be sure I'm comparing apples with apples on price?
But it comes with Aksiums, which I know from when I got my Dolan are 2.1kgs of pig iron that kill the feel of any bike. Wanted a pair of cheap mid depth budget carbon clinchers (38 or 50mm, tubeless, thru axle - don't need to be super light).
Originally I had planned to just get a cheap set of Chinese eBay wheels with generic Novatec hubs etc. As disk I am pretty confident they won't melt going downhill. But post Brexit I'm guessing that you're pretty much always guaranteed to be hit with import fees.
So choice to me seems to be:
1. Get some eBay specials at c£330 which by my guesstimate will turn into about £410 once all fees paid
2. Get a cheap UK sourced set like Prime at £560 or Merlin at £500
If the difference is only £90 I would almost certainly go for the UK sourced.
My questions really are:
- does anyone know of a better source of cheap carbon wheels?
- whats the process of calculating / paying import fees so I can be sure I'm comparing apples with apples on price?
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As for eBay they've been stung apparently and now add (and retain) the VAT from non-UK sourced produce (even if the seller is UK based). The VAT is not included in the price shown before you click to buy, this has happened to me, very annoying!
The low value VAT relief thing has been scrapped now too for stuff under £15 so I expect HMRC will be getting stricter on checking things.
I've noticed eBay saying that "VAT applies" now on some items, but only to some items that ship from China not all of them. Maybe if a seller says they are VAT registered then they assume the seller has paid the VAT.
Agree it may not have anything to do with Brexit, probably more to do with timing, but the other posts confirm my suspicions that the process around buying online from abroad has tightened up.
I'm thinking the Prime are the most likely because they are Centrelock, a known quantity and get me platinum at Wiggle for a year.
With respect to spending a bit more... that's not the point of this bike. I'm buying this bike so I can just use it and not worry about breaking something because I know I can replace bits for not much money, I have another bike for the bling stuff. Prime ticks those boxes because all the spares are available from Wiggle. £550 is already a large amount of money for such a bike so £800+ is getting silly.
https://road.cc/content/review/scribe-race-d-wheelset-276159
Given that they're for a disc brake bike then there isn't a brake track to be concerned about.
Otherwise I'd grab some Prime wheels over the Chinese imports as you'll get a guarantee and spare parts are cheap and readily available.
Free wheel could be noisier but if you like a quiet ride its no problem
I had to bin a Prime wheel because CRC/Prime couldn't tell me how to get the freehub off and where to get a replacement when it started sticking and they won't tell me how to replace the bearings on the other (it's not one of the ones on their YouTube channel).
Had the same issue with Cannondale with their own brand wheels.
Having said that, I have a set of Prime Pro alloys on another bike, and I've changed both the bearings and freehub in the past (Freehub from Wiggle, bearings not). The RR-V3s use the same so I think I'll be alright. Plus I now know to take apart and grease liberally immediately I get them and not rely on the "Japanese high quality bearings" to survive a dunking.