New Wheelset Thoughts
 

What are the best road bike wheels these days? Looking for aero of some sort. Willing to spend into the 3k range, so price shouldn’t be too much of a factor.

OP, that's a nice straightforward question. Be prepared for a five-page thread in which 2/3rds of the responses are from people telling you that you don't need such fancy wheels.

What kind of clearance do you have? Do you intend to run tubes or are you planning on tubeless?

3k for a set of wheels? Unless you are racing, does anyone really need something that fancy? If I'm going to pay that kind of money, the wheels need to be better than fancy. They need to be fancy smancy!

Well, $3k wheels are fancy smancy. Fancy starts at $1500 or so.

A little more info on your bike and how you ride might help. Honestly $3K is not necessary for really nice wheels.

I spent $1,400 shipped for a set of Light Bicycle wheels. Carbon rims, 24 spoke, DT Swiss 240 EXP hubs, about 1,400g, 38mm deep, 5 year warranty. You can pay a bit more for a lifetime warranty if you want. They will also work with you on custom builds. Great customer service.

Not sure on clearance. I run 28mm tires now and that's the max size. Tubeless.

Looks like you were right...

Yes, be very wary.
BTW, answer to OP's question is that he should check out a pair of Zondas.

;)

Best set of wheels for....what? Racing? Time trialing? Something else?

Disc or rim brake? Rider weight, riding conditions (typical slopes, terrain, and wind)?

You need to think a little bit more about what you want, because there's a ton of information out there on wheelsets and just saying you want something aero while expecting BF to deliver the answer to you is not going to cut it.
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Only 5 pages? 5 pages is weak. It needs to go to 10 at least. 11 would be better.

That's what I'm talking about! :D

There are a number of no rim tape tubeless wheels. Dura Ace, I think. Roval?

Zipp has some very nice wheels.

If you're okay with being exclusively tubeless, I've been really happy with going hookless. I'd look at the new Zipp 404 Firecrest - I think that the new 454 NSW are out of your budget, at least at MSRP. If those are a little too deep for your taste, the 303 Firecrest.

Take that 3k ....and ....

Go to the 6 closest bicycle dealers who sell such wheels

Listen to their effort to prove to you what is the 'latest, greatest, wowee - zowie' wheelset

Whichever shop can provide you with the best experience ....then ....

Take your billfold with the 3k in it and hand it to the salesperson and ask that salesperson to 'massage' it for you

Or, you could simply ask the professional team who is paying you to ride to provide the wheels gratis

Only $3000 in the budget?

Start with your set of Campagnolo Bora Ultra wheels.

Then if it doesn't match the groupset... go out and buy a Campagnolo Super Record 12 Speed EPS Hydraulic groupset.

Now, if that doesn't match the frame.

Go out and buy a Colnago C64 frame to go with the Super Record groupset to go with the Bora Ultra wheels.

I just ordered a set of wheels (albeit gravel) from BTLOS on February 11th. They shipped on Feb 19th, and arrived at New York on the 22nd. Hopefully I’ll have them within a week or so. I ordered a shallow carbon wheelset, cost $820 to my door. They (BTLOS) builds road wheelsets as well, I would recommend you check them out. Spend the remaining $2180 on a few epic bike vacations!

Come on, people; it's fancy schmancy!

I guess I have just bought some plain fancy (but not fancy schmancy) wheels:

Mavic Cosmic SLR 40 Carbon Wheelset - bike-components

Actual weight: 608 g (F) + 804 g (R) = 1,412 g

CliffordK These do not require rim tape for tubeless.

You provided almost no pertinent info. You can't be surprised at the responses.

Bad data in bad data out.

PBK had 303 Firecrest available last month for $1650 a set. Agree with others here that if you want to go tubeless, go hookless, you won’t be disappointed.

Loads of viable options I would have thought. Hard to know where to start. Do you have any favourite brands? Enve, Zipp, DT Swiss, Campag, Shimano, HED, Roval etc.
Any 3k aero wheel is going to get the job done with plenty in reserve and I don't think there is any wheelset that is a no-brainer standout from the crowd. They just have to tubeless compatible and optimised around 28 mm tyres in your case.

Are the best wheels necessarily a lot faster and ligher or is best also wheels that improve the handling of the bike by giving you a truer perception of what's going on underneath them? I guess that would be indicated by what many call "stiffness".

I recently bought zipp 303s hookless wheels with 23mm internal width. They cost $1300. I decided to go up 2mm on tire width to 30mm Pirelli p zero tires. They were very easy to install. I used michelin 28mm tubeless tires on fulcrum racing 3 wheels last year - no complaints.

Campy/Fulcrum wheels are excellent quality but they're not doing hookless yet.

My understand is that even going up to 35, the aero losses are negligible for us mere mortals (like a watt or two)