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First off this is more of a review of the pros and cons of carbon wheels over alloy wheels than just what I bought. I have tried a few other people bikes with carbon wheels before getting mine and they have ranged from Chinese specials to top line envies. I went from a set of Mavic crossmax xl to rovel Fattie (so top end alloy to mid/top end carbon).

There where four main reasons I went for these over other brands, they were one of the lightest trail carbon wheels around at 1550kg a pair (crossmax where 1800kg roughly), still very tough (mate has a set for a year before me and have had no issues, they can be converted to run as a boost set up with an adapter kit and lastly they come with plastic plugs for the spoke holes (meaning that if a spoke brakes you are not having to mess with perused rim tap and a puncture). First impression of getting them out th box was of the quality of them and how stiff they were (with spoke tensions so high). Comparing the weight of the carbon wheels to my old alloy wheels there was a difference but didn’t feel huge.

The two things I found on my first few rides were just how stiff they were and the pick up/acceleration of them. The stiffness was a problem at first, I spent a long time crashing/near misses on corners due to the directness of the wheels (alloy allowed a little bit of flex so you had to turn in a nano second early to allow the wheels to flex then run in, carbon wheels turned in when you turned). The pick up was more notable when pedalling off down hill/out of corners (this could of been due to new bearings and ratchet but even a few months in it feels the same). I kept type combo and pressures the same as before but I have had to play around with suspension setting a lot and still am, I found alloy wheels offered so much more comfort over rough rocky terrain so much so I now have to run less pressure in the fork and shock.

It might sound like I don’t like them but I really do, it’s just taken a while to adjust to them, I will be the first to say they will not suit a lot of riders and you really need good suspension to get the most out them. They really suit some one that is an aggressive rider, someone that takes the harder and faster lines. For price, weight and durability I would still recommend alloy rims to a lot of riders. I will keep an update going if there is any problem but so far so good