JochenRindt

Can anyone tell me anything about this brand? The mechanic at the shop I frequent had never heard of Saturae. After a bit of digging online, it seems that Saturae was Specialized's in-house brand of wheels? Is that correct? I'm interested to find out more about them because a bike I just bought came with nos Saturae rims built up with new spokes and hubs.

jadmt

yes that is what came on my early 80's allez

JochenRindt

Were they good wheels?

jadmt

I thought they were. I am sure there were better ones out there but I put a lot of miles on them and never had an issue.

LittleGinseng 

Specialized Saturne and Saturae rims, iirc, were manufactured by Mavic (France) and Fir (Italy) to specifications required by Specialized. Rims were of high quality as one would expect.

Piff 

Fairly light stuff. According to another thread on these here forums, the HC-19 rims are ~400g.

https://www.bikeforums.net/classic-v...ml#post3302253

I've got a pair laced to shimano 600 6207 hubs but can't comment to their quality, haven't ridden them yet.


edit: ah, found the original source: https://www.sheldonbrown.com/rinard/...m#clincherrims

Portlandjim

I designed these rims, the time period was1984. The MTB rims and at least one model of the 700c rims were made in Japan by Ukai. The light weight 700c rim HC19 was designed by me along with the engineering team of Wolber in France, and made by Wolber. The tubular rims were made by NISI in Italy. Fir was never involved, nor were Mavic. When we first introduced this rim line, the name was Saturn. Unknown to anyone at Specialized, the one man custom frame builder of Saturn Cycles, John Padgett of Davis, California was using this name. He had no trademark registered for this name, but we thought it best to change the name. This after the catalogs, ads and the first run of rims had already been produced. There are some Saturn labeled rims out there. Jim Merz

obrentharris 

I built a set of the Saturn rims onto a pair of Specialized hubs for my first mountain bike, great wheels that suffered years of abuse. I had the good fortune in the mid eighties to be downstream of a small but steady flow of blem's and discontinued components from Specialized.
Brent

repechage

I have an orphan front wheel with a Saturae HC19 rim, Specialized hub and Wheelsmith serial number label also.
I do not know what bike I purchased it was part of. I did end up with an orphan rear Specialized hub later.
I have casually looked for a matching rim, no luck so far. The anodizing color is a bit unique, a lighter warm grey.

I do own now a DiNucci era Allez frame set, maybe use them on that.

FrejusFlyer

I've got a pair of HC-19's laced to campy record hubs on an early 3Rensho Allez.

LittleGinseng 

Thank you, Jim, for the origin correction. It's good to have you here to keep us old timers on the straight and narrow.

Two of my bikes have wheels built up with Specialized rims. I'm also holding an NOS set of 36 hole Saturne HT- S20 rims for a future build. Beautiful rims!

JochenRindt

I just bought a 1981 Motobecane Le Champion that came with Saturae C20 rims. Thank you for the information.

Piff 

Jim, what went into designing a lightweight clincher in the 80s? Do you shoot for a certain weight, or certain characteristics, or...I suppose both at the same time?

Also, I find it odd that there are no modern aluminum clincher rims that are as light as vintage ones, can you speak to that?

RustyJames 

Still going strong!!

jadmt

post a photo? are you putting miles on it?

RustyJames 

Sadly, life demands have limited riding time but I’ll post a pic soon. So far, I love that bike much more than the later Aluminum version I own.

montclairbobbyb 

I have had several pairs of Saturae X28 rims on my StumpJumpers. They're single-walled, whereas.many newer rims are double-walled. At least that's one theory... Single walled are lighter?

Chombi1 

I noticed that the advertisement for the rims mentions "extra strength inherent from hard anodizing".....
I've seen this claim made by other rim makers.
I just don't understand how anodizing of any kind can really add to a rims strength though, as it is primarily just a colored oxidized finish that is just microns thick. Is it just all advertising mumbo jumbo??​​

Portlandjim

Hard anodizing is much thicker than decorative anodizing. This anodized coating is a ceramic, aluminum oxide, and can be applied to be over 0.1mm thick. On an aluminum rim with 1.0mm walls, this is 10%. The bulk elastic modulus of aluminum oxide is, minimum Value (S.I.) 137, maximum Value (S.I.) 324, compared to aluminum alloy of 69. So the stiffness of the rim can be noticeably improved, with modest added weight. Drawbacks: more expensive, can instigate cracking, reduced braking friction, and brake use can wear off the coating.

Another question was why modern aluminum rims weigh more than these 400 gram rims from 1984? The quick answer is cost. Making a light aluminum rims requires the correct amount of material in every position. Aluminum clincher rims are extruded, double wall designs require a porthole die. The die wears during use, this causes the wall thickness to increase. If one wants to keep the low design weight, then the die life will be shorter than for normal rims. It's also more difficult to make these thin wall extrusions, also to fabricate this into a rim. These days, carbon fiber offers much more options for making a stiff, strong and light bicycle rim. Aluminum works fine for making bicycle rims when a lower price point is required, but can't compete with carbon fiber composite material when performance can't be sacrificed. Jim Merz