Strazman

I have a GT Grade that serves as my commuter, gravel bike and road bike. The stock wheels are very robust but heavy and don't accelerate well. I wanted to keep them for gravel riding and get a second wheelset for dedicated pavement road riding. I am a strong, experienced rider, 187cm/6ft2 86kg/190lb .

I ended up buying a set of DT Swiss PR1600 DISC Spline 32. They run R511 rims on 350 hubs (36 ratchet) with 24 aero comp spokes. They are well balanced, roll beautifully and are comfortable on rough pavement. HOWEVER, they feel 'soft' and slow to get moving under acceleration. This was the main thing I wanted to improve on from the stock wheels. I wanted crisp acceleration, a more lively, urgent feel but these wheels are no better than stock in that regard.

My question is, what is the best bang for buck way to make the wheels stiffer / accelerate better? I'm leaning towards rebuilding the rear wheel onto DT Competition 2.0/1.8 spokes as they should build a stiffer wheel than the aero comps. Is this a good idea? Or do the wheel builders out there have a better suggestion?

shelbyfv

Possibly the issue is not your wheels. Since you've tried two sets w/o improvement.

trailangel

I love DT Swiss rims, but that wheelset is 1750 grams. Re-spoking will do nothing.
Spend some more $ and get a wheel set at least 250 grams lighter.

mvnsnd

Agreed. This is probably a better option:

November FSW3 Disc

Cyclist0108

I really like my November wheels and recommend them, but your complaint sounds like the tires are at fault.

WhyFi

What's your budget and what tires are you using? I don't know that lighter rims/tires makes any difference in speed, but I certainly believe that they make a difference in feel, especially when out of the saddle. Dropping another 100-150g per rim/tire would probably make a nice difference.

Craptacular8

What hub do they use? Novatec? I know i had some OEM disc wheels that I suspect had novatec hubs. Overall, they were fairly light for OEM at 1700 grams, they rolled ok, but didn't spin up, or hold speed very well. There was always the feeling that you were having to "ask" harder than you do with a known "good" wheel to get speed, and regardless, it didn't hold it at all once achieved. Makes me a little leery of no-name hubs, even if the wheel is relatively light.

The DT 350 hubs should be pretty decent. I probably don't throw enough power to notice the softness the OP is noting, but I'd agree with others, I'd probably look to the tires before I'd rebuild the wheel with different spokes.

Seattle Forrest

That was my first thought too. Definitely less $$$ than a new set of wheels.

cycledogg

Have you checked spoke tension? And also, as mentioned, tires.

Cyclist0108

A few years ago they used a White Industries-produced hub with a unique finish and rebranding. I'm not sure if this is different. But they do offer the option of a (non-rebranded) standard-issue WI hub with whatever color suits you, which is what I got. The website says this is $100 more.

They will build you whatever wheels you want (as long as they are structurally sound), and their custom rates are competitive. The quality is outstanding.

Esthetic

What tires?

Problem off the bat is its pretty heavy bike, so to feel tangible acceleration from 100-150g lighter wheelset is not always guaranteed and you spend lots of money to find out.

Plus it becomes more difficult when running 28c's and above, specially if using inner tubes. Compared to a tube on a road bike with say an 25 tire, tube may weight around 80grams...but a 28-32c tube or your typical Cross tube can weight up to 160g per tube. You could be running 3/4lb in just butyl at the wheels.

If you are not running tubeless, that would go a long ways in shedding weight plus adding a tire with better rolling resistance characteristics.

IME, owning a set of 1480g wheels, 1540g and 1725g wheels that i interchange between my bikes, the tire itself makes the most difference. Huge difference is felt between a GranPrix 4 Seasons/Gatorskin and Schwalbe Pre One tubeless/ Vittoria Corsa G+ etc... compared to weight difference alone running the same tire.

At one point i was running Schwalbe One clinchers with Conti 28--32c tubes on my TCR for winter use, its by far my most sluggish combination. On an Aero wheel and its fine maintaining speed, but acceleration from a roll is certainly more sluggish.

Brian Ratliff

It's a straight-forward question and your instincts are correct. Rebuilding with thicker spokes will create a stiffer wheel. Area goes up; force stays the same; spoke stress goes down; strain goes down proportionally; spoke deflects less = stiffer wheel. The stiffest wheel will be with 2.0 straight spokes, but double butted will last longer as the elbow is under less stress.

You can also stiffen the wheels by going to taller rims or using high flange hubs to shorten the spokes. In this case, if you keep the spokes the same aero spoke as on the OEM, stress stays the same, strain stays the same, but deflection goes down because the spoke is shorter. There is also deflection at the rim, so a taller cross-section rim will result in a stiffer wheel in its own right irrespective of the spokes.

Brian Ratliff

As long as the spokes are not actually slack, spoke tension does not change wheel stiffness.

noodle soup

I was wondering how long it would be until someone mentioned spoke tension. No matter how many times it is explained, some people never believe it.

HTupolev

The GT Grade has road-ish handlebars and quite a lot of geometric trail for a road bike. It's going to feel somewhat floppy and meandering when you're out of the saddle at low speed no matter what.

I'd be surprised if the stiffness of the wheels was actually affecting your acceleration to a significant degree; even the noodliest wheels are torsionally quite stiff.

This shouldn't make a difference unless the tension is so low that they're actually detensioning in use.

Kontact 

I also doubt the wheels are the issue.

TimothyH

Those who mention tires and tubes make a great point.

Always do the easy and cheap thing first.

The OP does not say what he is using but Rubino G+ Speed are light (25c @ 190 grams), fast and relatively inexpensive tires and can probably be found with latex tubes for less than $100.

It would be a an easy, cheap and fun experiment.


-Tim-

cycledogg

Well, there ya' go, has it been checked??

cycledogg

As stated, if spokes are slack, then stiffness is compromised. Has it been checked?

Bah Humbug

Nobody has suggested some Viagra yet? For the wheels, of course.

Kontact 

If the OP is 190 lbs and the 24 spokes are slack, they would have broken.

f4rrest

What pressure are you running?

Squishy tires can be slower.

cycledogg

Not necessarily

Kontact 

Okay, the OP is riding on "slack" spokes, which would allow the wheel to flop back and forth into the stays and brakes, but he somehow didn't notice.

Strazman

Thanks for all the feedback guys.

I appreciate the comments regarding tyres but i am using the same tyres, tubes and pressure as on the stock wheels. I am only comparing these to the stock wheels.

Having said that, the wheels have a 18mm ID, the stock wheels are 20.3mm. It is feasible that the narrower rim is resulting in more lateral casing flex for the same tyre and pressure, which would be a cause of the sluggish feeling.

As a bigger guy who is more MTB than road rider, ive always prefered 28 to 25 for road tyres. Im now thinking I either need to swap to 25s or swap the rims to DT 521s (20mm ID). Really wishing now that I'd bought the ER1600 instead which, while a bit heavier, run the wider rim. Live and learn I guess.