TiHabanero

Just laced and trued a set of Open Pro C rims in the CD finish and the rim joint is so off that I am unable to get the rims round. There is a 1mm difference in rim height from one side of the joint to the other. Never had this issue with Mavic rims before. Next time I will listen to my son and go with Hed Belgiums. Very disappointed as the "bump" will be felt when riding.

shelbyfv

Unexpected, for sure. Bummer you didn't check before you laced them, but being Mavic, I might not have either.

seedsbelize 

Sorry to hear it. I spent the afternoon measuring for a couple sets--one tubular, one clincher. One set is Mavic. Thanks for the heads up.

Crankycrank

Very unusual with Mavic from my experience. Contact Mavic and see what they say. Could be a defect they're willing to exchange for you.

ThermionicScott 

I've read that Open Pros aren't what they once were, now that they're out of favor. Contacting Mavic is a good idea.

delbiker1 

I have a pair of Open Pro laced to Ultegra hubs that I purchased used from a BF member. They are terrific wheels.

TiHabanero

Got them from LBS, so I will just have them deal with the warranty issue. Believe I will move on to a different brand. Arch Type has a CD finish rim so will look into that.

Marcus_Ti

Lots of great alloy rims....AForce, Easton, HED, Astral, H PLUS Son. For a rim-brake build, the AForce Al33 are beautiful rims that are high quality.

Personally...Mavic quit being interested in rims over a decade ago....and the new Open Pro strangely low tension to boot.

HillRider

The "CD" (aka hard anodizing) finish is not a real good idea. I wears off fast and the worn hard coating is brittle and a stress raiser making the rim prone to cracking. I had a set of older Mavic Open 4 CD rims and they were the earliest failures I have ever owned.

seedsbelize 

And I've been riding hard anodized Arayas for years without problems.

HillRider

Really hard anodized or just color anodized? The former is much thicker, more brittle and prone to crack. The later is very thin and just cosmetic. Notice Mavis, the first to offer hard anodized rims, no longer does.

seedsbelize 

HillRider

OK, I'm convinced. How many miles on those rims? My Open 4CD rear rim cracked after at 11,000 miles which, as I mentioned, is the earliest failure I've ever experienced.

ThermionicScott 

Not just hard anodized but SUPER hard anodized!

TiHabanero

Back in the day several guys I raced and trained with had the CD finish on Mavic rims that caused no issues. I know the finish wears off on the brake surface, but I like that look! Looks used hard and put away wet, so to speak. If I get 3 years out of them I am OK with it. The only rims I have had that went more than 3 years have been Araya and Rigida rims, the old narrow 700c rims. Built a pair of Mavic Open Pro rims back around 94 and the rear went bad after 2 years, but I was a lot harder on them back then.

The H Plus Son Archtype rim looks very appealing as it is hard anodized. Will see what the shop's supplier is willing to do. Hopefully trade them out.

Lakerat

Why did you build them with this defect?

well biked

Sorry to hear about the defect in the OP C's. I just built a wheelset using the recently renamed "Open Pro T" rims, a very close cousin of the C's (the T's are the tubular version), and found the quality of the rims to be excellent. I've also dealt with quite a few of the C's recently, and my impression is that those rims are the same old Open Pro as the last several years. I've been generally impressed with the QC on all of them. I also like the more modern, wider versions of the Open Pros now, both disc and rim brake versions, with the elaborate machining. Those remind me of the rims from the higher end Kysyrium wheels, which are also excellent rims IME.

Our shop doesn't deal with Mavic nearly as much as we used to, but I am glad they are still there, and again, IME, it does seem that the QC is still there on their better stuff. Let's hope the defect you experienced was just a very rare anomaly. FWIW, I did have to send back a pair of HED Belgium Plus rim brake rims not long ago because of an obvious defect in the brake track on both rims. It was like a divot in the brake surface on both rims, in an identical spot on both rims, an inch or so from the welded seam. And HED's QC is usually second to none IME.

One other note: I did find it funny that Mavic now refers to their most traditonally styled tubular rim as the "Open Pro T." "Open" means clincher! Or at least that's what I always thought it meant in reference to the "Open Pro." The wheels I recently built using the Open Pro T's did come out very nice, the rims were flawless. But still.....

HillRider

Any chance those "divots" were there intentionally as brake track wear indicators? The idea is when the rims wear to the point the divots disappear they are too thin to continue using.

well biked

Absolutely not intentional, these flaws effectively made the rims out of round, and would have been very noticeable when braking.

ThermionicScott 

That "open" versus "tubular" thing is funny, isn't it? We have people calling fancy clinchers "open tubulars" now...

Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that the original Open Pro was the clincher version of the Reflex tubular rim, and now that the OP has more name recognition than the Reflex, they renamed the latter. (I might have missed some iterations in between.)

BTW, it's a relief to hear you say that Mavics are still generally good, but for a few bad apples. I've always liked their rims.

well biked

I hear ya on all of that....The Mavic Reflex name was more associated with the tubular version IME, but there was a clincher version of the Reflex also, that later became the Open Pro. We sold Reflex tubular rims until fairly recently, but that name hasn't been a clincher rim for awhile. Y

TiHabanero

OP here. Had to use the rear wheel this past weekend and am happy to report that the rise at the joint is not causing a problem. After the ride I pulled the tire off and "felt" along the bead seat and realized that there was no deviation of the bead seat. If there had been a deviation of the bead seat, the "bump" would have been noticeable while riding. This is a relief as I have no option to return the rims at this point.

Earlier this spring I built a set of wheels using the Open Pro Sport rims, and they were perfect, so my surprise with the Open Pro C rims was well, a surprise! Anyway, I am satisfied with the wheel build. If the rear lasts more than 3 years, I will consider it a super wheel!

jadocs

In my experience, Mavic customer service has been phenomenal. I'm sure they would make it right for you.