Sogood'll be happy to hear this, so here we go....
The first thing I noticed upon taking them out of the box was 'wow, the stickers look even worse in person', so they were halved before anything else happened.
The overall looks are very nice. They are very shiny, nice bladed spokes and nice decals (after halving them in number). Upon closer inspection, you begin to realise why they only costed $330AUD.
The hubs are the most simple mechanism (albeit extremely effective) you could use. The hub shell, a straight alloy axle (one groove on each side to hold an o-ring, maybe a stopper for each bearing but I didn't go that far), two cartridge bearings and two dustcaps. The dustcaps are just that, nothing more. They do use sealed cartridge bearings though, but I would reserve this for nice days. The dustcaps are very simple conical-ish pieces of aluminium. They have an o-ring on the inner face to hold it in place and a grub-screw to secure them to the axle. They primarily serve as a safeguard for the bearings and to space out the axle enough to fit in the forks. The rear is a little more complex, though, using cones to preload the bearings.
The spokes are very nice wide blades, but none of this fatness like ksyriums, they are nice and thin. The J-bends are very thick, so hopefully they should be a little more durable.
The nipples are just regular nipples. I think its brass all round.
The rim is something else. The joint is painfully obvious, but could be hidden a little better with some filler and paint, or just filler. The special part of this rim is the braking surface. While the sleeve is quite obvious, this braking surface sits about 1mm off the rim. You'll never wear this out. It has also been very VERY well machined. The regular micro-grooves are present, but it is dead smooth. The rim joint is impossible to distinguish. The front wheel also spins forever and is laced 1 cross.
The rear is nice too. The flanges are quite narrowly spaced and its only laced 1 cross too
. We'll see what the stiffness is like tomorrow. The freehub body is very well machined, clever, but not very nicely finished. This doesn't matter cause its under a cassette. It has extra material where the theoretically most used cogs are (around the 16-21 depending on what cassette you are using) I presume this is to stop the cogs 'biting' in that area. The rest is fairly straightforward there, still needs the 1mm spacer for 10 speed. It does have a clever little grease port (I assume) which was used pretty quickly with some fine fishing-reel grease which is good for freehubs. It needed it. It seems the bearings on the rear will take a little while to break in. It is more complex with better seals than the front hub. As I said, its only laced 1cross with 20 spokes, despite the fact that the flanges are not low by any means.
I will post pics of the bare wheels, mounted wheels and details tomorrow, along with a ride report.
The first thing I noticed upon taking them out of the box was 'wow, the stickers look even worse in person', so they were halved before anything else happened.
The overall looks are very nice. They are very shiny, nice bladed spokes and nice decals (after halving them in number). Upon closer inspection, you begin to realise why they only costed $330AUD.
The hubs are the most simple mechanism (albeit extremely effective) you could use. The hub shell, a straight alloy axle (one groove on each side to hold an o-ring, maybe a stopper for each bearing but I didn't go that far), two cartridge bearings and two dustcaps. The dustcaps are just that, nothing more. They do use sealed cartridge bearings though, but I would reserve this for nice days. The dustcaps are very simple conical-ish pieces of aluminium. They have an o-ring on the inner face to hold it in place and a grub-screw to secure them to the axle. They primarily serve as a safeguard for the bearings and to space out the axle enough to fit in the forks. The rear is a little more complex, though, using cones to preload the bearings.
The spokes are very nice wide blades, but none of this fatness like ksyriums, they are nice and thin. The J-bends are very thick, so hopefully they should be a little more durable.
The nipples are just regular nipples. I think its brass all round.
The rim is something else. The joint is painfully obvious, but could be hidden a little better with some filler and paint, or just filler. The special part of this rim is the braking surface. While the sleeve is quite obvious, this braking surface sits about 1mm off the rim. You'll never wear this out. It has also been very VERY well machined. The regular micro-grooves are present, but it is dead smooth. The rim joint is impossible to distinguish. The front wheel also spins forever and is laced 1 cross.
The rear is nice too. The flanges are quite narrowly spaced and its only laced 1 cross too
. We'll see what the stiffness is like tomorrow. The freehub body is very well machined, clever, but not very nicely finished. This doesn't matter cause its under a cassette. It has extra material where the theoretically most used cogs are (around the 16-21 depending on what cassette you are using) I presume this is to stop the cogs 'biting' in that area. The rest is fairly straightforward there, still needs the 1mm spacer for 10 speed. It does have a clever little grease port (I assume) which was used pretty quickly with some fine fishing-reel grease which is good for freehubs. It needed it. It seems the bearings on the rear will take a little while to break in. It is more complex with better seals than the front hub. As I said, its only laced 1cross with 20 spokes, despite the fact that the flanges are not low by any means. I will post pics of the bare wheels, mounted wheels and details tomorrow, along with a ride report.
