I'v been through many wheelsets for road, gravel and cx. My current gravel/cx favorite may be surprising for some. Novatec CXD discs weigh in at 1470gm for the set. I have about 8000 miles of gravel and cx on my current set and have yet to touch a spoke. They are true as the day I bought them. Best part, you can buy the set for about $400 or so. Light weight, bombproof and cheap. Tough to beat if you ask me. I know Novatec isn't a sexy brand but if it checks all the boxes . . .
Paco1961 wrote:I'v been through many wheelsets for road, gravel and cx. My current gravel/cx favorite may be surprising for some. Novatec CXD discs weigh in at 1470gm for the set. I have about 8000 miles of gravel and cx on my current set and have yet to touch a spoke. They are true as the day I bought them. Best part, you can buy the set for about $400 or so. Light weight, bombproof and cheap. Tough to beat if you ask me. I know Novatec isn't a sexy brand but if it checks all the boxes . . .
"Lightweight, strong, cheap. Pick 2"
These seem to fly directly in the face of that statement. How much do you weigh, if you don't mind my asking?
I shudder to think of what will happen to those 270g rims when you bomb through a pothole.
They're xc rims with a 3 year warranty so I'm sure they're fine for this. I'm more worried about hard cornering with hookless rims and higher than mtb pressures.
EDIT- they're 280g and have a 5 year warranty, upgradable to lifetime.
ted king and colin strickland are 2 big names in gravel racing that run deep carbon wheels. however, their wins likely have a lot more to do with other things than their wheels.
Looking at other good gravel racers, I don't see a whole lot of deep carbon wheels. However, coming from a road background, I know how useful deep carbon wheels can be.
For one, gravel races tend to be a lot more scattered than road races. If you're contending for podium or the win, you're gonna be in the wind a lot. And if you're in the winning breakaway with a stiff crosswind, deep wheels will help tremendously.
I feel like 35-45 is a good balance point for getting the aero gains, without exposing yourself too much to a hole in the rim.
Haha, the debate continues! I think the top (fastest) riders at a given gravel event are going to get an aero benefit, at certain times during the event. And it depends on the event, and road conditions. For the rest of us, ehh...but if your wheels and your bike look cool and make you happy, then there's nothing wrong with that. And with carbon rims these days, something 35-55mm still isn't terribly heavy.
But this is why road bikers have climbing wheels, TT wheels, Sprint/Crit wheels, and all purpose every day wheels. So, the moral of the story, get yourself more wheels! One pair isn't going to be perfect for every single situation, so get yourself 2 or 3! 😉
P.S. loving the sub 1500g 23mm deep carbon wheels oleritter built for me similar to what he posted above.
oleritter wrote:So, the moral of the story, get yourself more wheels! One pair isn't going to be perfect for every single situation, so get yourself 2 or 3!
oleritter wrote:
Spoken like a wheel builder haha!
The other think that G Vroomen once said that really answers all this debate is that runners draft and it makes a difference at their speeds. Watch a pro marathon..
I really don't understand the basis for being passionate that aero is such bs and only applies to elite speeds. Science shows that weight only matters so much but many cyclists think every gram matters. OTOH, science shows aero does matter but many think it does not apply to regular folks. Again, the only logic I can find is that you can weigh you bike and know you got something for your $ while aero isn't that simple..
My favorite thing in this thread is the 6% grade aero "rule". Really? Aero is speed based and no two people will ride a given grade at the same speed so to me that is just simplistic and unfounded.. You can't even begin to say there is an average speed for a given grade, especially without some length factor..
I recognize that this sounds overly critical; I truly don't mean it that way. I find it incredibly interesting that folks see this so many different ways.. It causes me to question my own thinking which of course is a good thing!
Just exchanged some emails with Light Bicycle about new aero gravel rims. I'll ask about projected weight and if they're hooked or not. I'd prefer hooked for running 32mm gp5000s, but it wouldn't be a deal breaker for gravel.
Yes, it is almost finished. It is 32mm wide, 38mm/50mm/65mm deep. There are 3 different depth options.
But they will be falcon pro rims. The rim price will be around USD265 each, 5 years warranty.
Volsung wrote:Just exchanged some emails with Light Bicycle about new aero gravel rims. I'll ask about projected weight and if they're hooked or not. I'd prefer hooked for running 32mm gp5000s, but it wouldn't be a deal breaker for gravel.
Yes, it is almost finished. It is 32mm wide, 38mm/50mm/65mm deep. There are 3 different depth options.
But they will be falcon pro rims. The rim price will be around USD265 each, 5 years warranty.
One point of confusion which comes up in aero discussions and wind tunnel tests, such as the one by Specialized, is how speed affects drag and overall time in one's performance.
Obviously if one is riding at 13 mph it'll take twice as long to complete a 26 mile course than another rider averaging 26 mph. The difference in wind resistance at 13 mph is less than at 26 mph. So yes the aero effect is less. But since one is riding twice as long, the time benefit of the aero wheels amounts to about the same time improvement over the 26 mile course.
A general rule I've seen on in a number articles targeted to time trial (aka road) bikes, is that the optimal rim width is at least 105% of the tire width. What the Specialized test demonstrated is that, while the wider tire was not optimal, there still were gains to be realized with a deep aero wheel.
Assuming a crosswind producing 40 sec advantage per 40km, over a 75 mile (120 km) course you're looking at a 2 minute advantage with the deep aero wheels. If the wind is mostly straight on there was a mere 15 sec advantage.
My belief is that if one is in a pack of riders, this will reduce the wind resistance of not only the rider, but also that of the bike including the wheels. I haven't seen tests which prove or disprove this belief. I also believe that the slowing and accelerating which naturally occurs in packs also diminishes the aero advantage. For these reasons I'd be more inclined to get a rim with a height in the 30 mm to 40 mm range.
FWIW - The Industry Nine AR25 wheelset comes in at 1500 (ish) gm but $1200 so not cheap. Also these are on the narrower side 25mm and only 25mm height (depth).
I've ordered a set of the WR50 (50mm deep) so I'll give some feedback once I have ridden them arrive. I already have a lightweight set of LB MTB rims laced to road hubs on my gravel bike, they weigh only 1200g with DT240 hubs. I have done 8000km on them over the last 11 months, and they have been great.
I was convinced of the aero gains of a wide and deep rim after reading the new launch of DT Swiss GRC1400 gravel wheels here https://www.dtswiss.com/en/gravel
My first tkeaway from their research was that there is only a small aero penalty for going just wider than the rim, and a large penalty for going much wider. In road whees, there is a 105% rule which states that the optimal aero relationship is when the wheel is 105% to 110% of the tyre width. For gravel, that makes the rim vulnerable to rim strikes. With 33mm wide wheels such as their GRC1400, there is only a 5W penalty to run 35mm wide tyres rather than 30mm wide, and a further 15W penalty to increase from 35mm slicks to 42mm knobby tyres.
My second takeaway was the 7% improvement in rolling resistance when increasing from a 22C inner to a 24C inner width. (35mm tyre @ 4.5 bar / 65psi), thats only a 2 Watt difference per tyre, but if you are racing for hours, these improvements all add up.
All of those are wheels are quite a bit wider than the Roval rim used in the Win-tunnel video, so we imagine they would perform even better aerodynamicly, and certainly will be better as far as tire stabilty and such.
The big problem with aero gains is how hard they are to measure and report. On the marginal gains Podcast Josh Poertner talks about the difference in drag when you change yaw angle slowly vs when you change it quickly. That is just one example. Tire choice matters a lot too. Then there is the question of how to report the different yaw angle results. Average? Weighted average? How weighted?
DTSwiss GRC 1400: 24mm internal, 33mm external width, 42mm deep, 1634g claimed weight. Bontrager Aeolus Pro 3V: 25mm internal, 32mm external, 1542g measured weight without rim stars or valves. Enve SES 3.4 AR: 25mm internal, 32mm external width, 39/42mm deep, 1399 claimed weight
widerisfaster wrote: , and a further 15W penalty to increase from 35mm slicks to 42mm knobby tyres.
That makes me think one can prove anything with statistics.
My tires have a maximum spread of 50 watts rolling resistance (a pair) at 20mph. That is a 75 watt spread at 30mph - although I can't hold 30mph on the slower knobbies.
It would be interesting to see what the spread is for a good tire like the Schwalbe G-One series in changing tread pattern from speed to all around to aggressive.
I'm a little skeptical of their claim of " the 7% improvement in rolling resistance when increasing from a 22C inner to a 24C inner width."
Looking to do some (semi)serious gravel racing, everything from gravel kermesse races (~30-35 miles) to longer 100+ mile races
So how do you roll? Lightweight wheels or deeper wheels? Do the deeper, more aero wheels help that much more or would lightweight wheels be better?
I'm not talking about 60mm deep, just 35-40mm or possibly 50mm if it helps.
Interested in opinions, especially from those who have both. Thanks.
You have to have an idea on your speed, aero is everything, but wheels are not that important in the whole picture. If you speed is 20mph+ often, aero plays a significant role, but spend money on your skinsuit, frontal area. If you use aero bars, even cheap clip-on ones this will have a much larger impact on speed. Personally 40mm deep wheels would be welcome, but at the cost they come with, you should spend on other things first, and perhaps just have wheels that are solid and help your tyres roll well. I think carbon wheels are overrated for most gravel riding. The money is almost always spent better elsewhere. Do you have good aero socks, gloves, helmet, skinsuit, aerobars already?
ljsmith wrote:From everything I have read, unless you are riding in the mountains aero trumps weight no matter what speed you ride. In fact some "experts" claim that the slower you go the more benefit you get since the yaw angles of wind increase the slower you go. The only caveat being the tire width need to be matched to the rim width. If you are running 40mm tires and the external rim width is 28mm, you really won't get any aero benefit. I am not aware of any aero rims with an external width of 40mm. I think the Reynolds ATR is probably the widest at 23mm internal and 30mm external.
To sum up, in theory aero would be better. But in reality there currently no aero rims wide enough (at least that I know of) to get much of an aero benefit with gravel width tires.
What you say is correct, but aero has more benefit at higher speeds. It's just in total time won at lower speeds you gain more, while less as a % of time. There won't be really any good aero benefit from wheels in gravel due to the wide tyres, but DT Swiss and Enve do have wide external rims as well. Or Hunt has a special project for road aero with 30mm+ external wheels. Maybe could couple with G-one Speed or G-one Allround for some races.
I personally do see aero as a advantage when you ride solo with headwinds 😉 ..and if you are starting to head back home ....LOL... That happens to me quite a lot of time.
