Eric F 

I've been running tubeless 25mm tires on my #1 road bike since I got it 3 years ago. I weigh 180-185 and run 75F/80R in Conti GP5000TLs. For me, it works really well. However, if I was swapping tires frequently, I might stick with tubes.

msu2001la

If my googling is correct, your Mavic's are 17mm internal and around 1550g. Entry level carbon wheels are all around 1500g, so the weight is basically the same. Aero gains are marginal. Unless you're tracking rides at race speeds, you probably won't notice these gains (and arguably your riding position, clothing, helmet would provide bigger gains).

The main benefits would be wider rims and tubeless. The Hunt 30 disc is 21mm internal width, and 30mm deep. This seems like a decent choice, but those measurements are both fairly conservative. I don't know what kind of tire clearance your frame has, but if it can fit 28mm tires I'd look for wider rims with an internal width of 23mm, and target 45mm as more of an "all-around" depth, which will get you a few more watts of those hard-to-measure aero gains, and also look a little more "bling" but will still be fine in windy conditions.

You should also check out Light Bicycle, lots of similar options for similar money. I think they've got some 23mm internal stuff that is in the 45mm depth range. If you're all-in on tubeless you might consider looking at some of the hookless options from Zipp or Enve, which are just a little more money but come with solid warranty and reputation.

Personally, I wouldn't worry about justifying this purchase in terms of measurable speed gains. Life is short, riding nice wheels is nice, even if they serve no purpose other than looking/sounding cool. Go for it.

bbbean 

If you're swapping tires frequently, you should have another wheelset.

Eric F 

Wheelsets are significantly more expensive than tires.

bbbean 

Yes they are, and if you can't afford two wheelsets, you have to decide whether you want to swap tires regularly or just live with the tires that are on the bike. We all make compromises.Personally, I've found it well worth the price of admission to have multiple wheelsets. YMMV.

VegasJen

I don't know how to take this comment.
Interesting perspective. Any more information on the advantages versus conventional tubes? (link is fine)
OK. Thanks. It's becoming a little clearer now. But does this mean that tubeless is made to a different standard (e.g. thicker casing or something)?

Eric F 

Apparently, tFUnK likes swapping out tires. My tendency is to find what I like and stick with it. However, the "find what I like" process might involve some frequent tire changes. I have just gone through this with my gravel bike.

alcjphil

The tubeless version of any tire will be somewhat heavier than the tube type version of the same tire. somewhere between 30 and 50 grams heavier. How much heavier will depend on whether the tire is tubeless ready, meaning that you can't ride it without sealant, or tubeless meaning that the tire is able to hold air even if sealant isn't added. However, most tubeless users opt to use sealant even then for further puncture protection. The bead of a tubeless tire has a different shape than a tube type tire in order to seal to the rim which has a specific shape to allow the bead to seat and seal the tire

tFUnK

I swap tires now and then, and prefer that to swapping wheelsets as that's more expensive, and I'd have to keep track of cassettes/chains, etc. Then going from carbon to alloy I'd have to change pads as I'm running rim brakes. Admittedly I'm probably an edge case here, but it's enough for me to not go tubeless on my skinny tire road bikes. On my gravel bike, I went tubeless and it's set and forget, even though I sometimes do want to swap knobbies for slicks.

tFUnK

During this particularly wet rainy season, I didn't ride much but had plenty of garage projects. I was swapping wheels and tires between different road frames just to figure out what worked best. Found out through this process that some of my 28mm tires fit some frames but not others, hence the swapping around. Also busted out the wet tires during some weeks and then back to summer tires the next. Not fun, but certainly more manageable (as you concurred) than if I were dealing with tubeless setups.

Eric F 

Swapping wheels between my bikes doesn't work so well. Of my 7 bikes (5 of which I ride with some regularity), none of them have the same brake/cassette/axle configuration.
1. Road Bike - Rim brake, 11s Campy, QR
2. Gravel Bike - Disc, 11s Shimano, Thru-axle
3. MTB - Disc, 12s SRAM, Boost thru-axle
4. Singlespeed MTB - 26", rim brake, single cog on Shimano freehub, QR
5. Trainer Bike - Rim brake, 10s Shimano, QR
6. Road Bike - Rim brake, 9s Shimano, QR
7. Road Bike - Rim brake, 6s SunTour, QR

Mtracer

I ride mostly carbon rims, but I don't think they are magic. They may be lighter, if not too deep. Depth is an issue with crosswinds. I'm in fact getting ready to build a shallower 28 mm depth carbon wheel just to put on the front when the forecast is for higher winds. I normally run 45 mm depth. Of course, you can go a lot deeper than that.

I'm not sure you would feel much difference between what you have and carbon wheels. Potentially lighter weight which you may not notice. Stiffness, may be a thing, but it doesn't sound like you are pushing the limits of wheel stiffness like racing might do. Or if you went deep on new rims, weight may not be much different but you might be more aero.

I'm 62, not a racer, and just like nice things. I like the sound of my medium deep 45 mm rims.

On my main bike (A Trek Checkpoint gravel bike), I only recently got around to building up the set of 45 deep wheels for road riding. I specifically chose them for their external width of 32 mm. It pairs very well with a Continental GP 5000 28 mm tire (30 mm actual on these relatively wide rims). Gives me a near optimal tire to rim width ratio for best aero performance. Can I tell the difference? Probably not. What I can tell the difference is the tires themselves as compared to the 40 mm wide gravel tires.

I picked up 2 MPH for the same effort. Absolutely huge difference in rolling resistance. I'm saving 40+ W, according to bicycleingrollingresisatnce.com. Now, this is a very good road tire (Conti GP 5000 S TR 28 mm) vs a mediocre gravel tire (Bontrager GR1 Team issue 40 mm). So, very much an apples to oranges to oranges comparison.

Point is, if you want to feel a difference, compare the rolling resistance of the tires you use against the best you could use. You might be surprised how big a difference that makes, unless you are already using a high performance tire.

To the OP, if you just want to ride something different, then I say go for the carbon wheels. But I'd get something that would be more different than what you already have. Not just material. If your current rims are shallow, then get some medium deep carbon rims. If it's going to be windy, you can always put the old, shallow front wheel on.

LarrySellerz

Listen buddy, the dude has a Mavic something or other. It's clearly not a high end aero wheel, which is the first upgrade one should look to get on a road bike after tires if they want to spend money to go faster. I dont need to know the details of what his current mavic thing is to answer what I did.

Koyote

Thanks, buddy. I was thinking that my old sig line was getting old. This new one is perfect!

Hermes

I think you hit the cover off the ball with the above post. I can add that I ride the coast a lot in SD and ride Fast Forward carbon clincher 45 mm wheels. Is wind a problem? Meh. Of course, it can be but I have not found it to be problematic during the times that I ride and where I can feel the wind more is around Torrey Pines State beach descending either from the top of TP or from Del Mar. If you are going to ride in wind with whitecaps on the ocean and gusts then deeper section wheels will be more of a problem. if the wind is blowing hard, I do not ride and it is not because of the wheels. I could swap out to standard wheels.

With respect to can you feel the difference or is it worth it. I chase incremental gains so I think deep section wheels with tires that match the rim are worth it and when everything is added together, the wattage savings are worth it to me.

hubcyclist

so from my own experience, I think people massively overrate the benefit of wheels, just go on any forum on the internet and you'll see people recommending deeper carbon wheels. there's a video by Jeff Linder (norcal cycling) that he made a while back where he did loops with regular alloy wheels and deeper carbon and the carbon wheels were around 1min faster per hour. I've been loaned 60mm/88mm wheels to try out and from the few rides I did, my overall speed for my power was not noticeably different compared to my usual rides with my stock Axis Sport wheels on my Allez. Not only that, but the "feel" of them (as people often like to claim) really wasn't any different. Having said that, I recently bought some 36mm deep wheels that were being cleared out by a retailer because they were such a deal, and I have some personal goals where I'm trying to shave off a few mins over 5hrs, but I've also done a bunch else like using conti gp5000 tires and latex tubes, getting 38mm aero profile handlebars, using an aero helmet, wearing a speedsuit, and I even got rule28 aero socks. So hopefully the sum of savings will help. But I think people overhype the benefit of wheels

GhostRider62

OP wants to do long distance events like randonneuring with Paris Brest Paris being his goal. PBP is 1218 km with 41,000 feet of climbing. Aero benefits slower riders more than faster riders in that the slower rider saves more time because they are on the route longer. This time savings is often referred to as money in the bank. I consider it more sleeping time. A set of 40-50mm carbon wheels with bladed spokes and something like 28mm or 30 mm GP5000 tubeless tires will save 3-5 hours compared to 36 hole box shaped rims and slow tires. Speed will drop approx. 1-1.25 km/h and over 1218 km, old equipment can cost you a night's sleep. I would argue a tight fitting reflective gilet and the rest of the kit are more important but the truth is when it is 39F and you are wet, you grab anything you can to stay warm. Wheels? They have no emotion or feelings.

chaadster

Dunno if you’re misstating the results and misrepresenting his takeaway, or if you’re talking about a different video, but here he gained over 1min out of 33mins:


In any case, aero benefits will manifest differently for diffferent cyclists based on how they ride, and so 1saying saving 1min on 30 at 250w on a relatively flat course may not have significance or relevance to someone who wants to, say, conserve energy at a 180w average for a 3hr ride, nor to the person who wants to maximize the speed results of their final, all-out effort in the village limit group sprint. SImilarly, we’re not going to know from NorCal cycling’s vid if the deeper wheels help his recovery when he’s sitting in the bunch or whether that means you or I will get more recovery when doing the same because we have different fitness and physiology, and the rides will have different numbers of riders in the bunch and be moving at different speeds.

What we know for certain is that aerodynamic benefits exist, right? So yeah, while it’s possible to overhype the benefits of aero wheel gains, we have to acknowledge that they’re there but may be specific and not global, by which I mean, for example, they may benefit one cyclist in a group ride scenario but not really show up in that same cyclist’s ride data from a solo ride.

GhostRider62

The biggest mistake is to assume that power or time savings measured in wind tunnels at 30 mph are meaningless to mere mortals. They measure at those speeds due to extreme technical challenges making a 15-20 mph wind tunnel. The CdA figures from 30mph can be used to calculate savings for mere mortals, but the most important point is time savings are GREATER for slower riders than faster riders.

Another mistake is to assume since a famous randonneur is fast on 36 hole boxed rims and 48mm tires, you will also be fast. You might. If you were also previously a Cat 1 and still ride a ton of miles per week. Mere mortals can use all the marginal gains they can afford and for which they can turn a blind ear to the snide curmudgeonlyish comments.

If you want to know what a reasonable setup for randonneuring is, look to RUSA #64 bikes.

hubcyclist

I was referring to this video
19sec saved over 20ish mins at 320w

And to reiterate, there's obviously something there, if I didn't think so I wouldn't have bought other wheels, but I think they're overhyped by many.

rosefarts

Honest question here.

If we’re talking about the same weight, is there a performance advantage to carbon?

I built a set of wheels for my gravel bike around Stan’s Crests and Bitex hubs. I think they’re about 1400gm but maybe a bit more. There are a lot of lighter carbon wheels out there but there are also a lot that are just as heavy if not heavier. Mine have no aerodynamic advantages but neither do so many others.

So are my aluminum wheels of a certain weight and cross section weaker/softer/less durable than a similarly spec’d carbon model? I’ve not managed to knock mine out of true yet, again, gravel not MTB.

Totally different discussion if I wanted sub1200g (or 1100g) wheels or if I wanted 40mm or deeper.

tomato coupe

You might be trying to compare two things that don't exist, i.e. carbon and aluminum wheels that have the same cross section and weigh the same.

Koyote

Also: My guess is that, in this hypothetical comparison, the cf rims would indeed by stiffer and stronger; but the alloy rims might be stiff enough and strong enough.

superdex

kinda fify. I mean, that's the whole point of using carbon in this application, right?

ratell

I'm 54 and not racing anybody and I found the upgrade to carbon wheels to be the most noticeable upgrade. I have low end carbon wheels (Roval C38). They are a little lighter than what I had before and a little more aero. The most noticeable difference is that carbon wheels are at the same time stiffer and more compliant. You end up feeling more responsive and more grounded. They are expensive, but I think it's a great upgrade.