Where it goes up, it goes down again - and with it the strain on man and machine changes. The cyclist struggles uphill. He experiences the benefits of light wheels, feels with every pedal stroke that they can be easily turned. But from the top of the pass, the signs change. The rider enjoys and recovers. Now the wheels suffer, especially the rims when braking. When the first carbon rims came onto the market, they caused considerable problems: they braked badly, wore out pads in record time and often died of heat exhaustion. A lot has changed in the meantime: the brake flanks are specially treated, the resin as a carrier material is more heat-resistant and brake pads last longer. The manufacturers promise to have the problems under control - also and above all with clincher rims, the sensible and preferred choice of many amateur athletes for everyday road cycling. However, clincher rims are much more demanding in terms of design than those for tubular tyres: The rim flanges have to withstand the pressure of the tyres and brakes and also resist the heat of braking.
But are the wheels up to the challenge? The hard braking on dozens of hairpin bends every 20 seconds? Full braking on a descent of a mountain pass when a car suddenly turns in from a side road? The unavoidable continuous braking when you are stuck in a dense crowd of other cyclists or car traffic on a downhill stretch? An experience from the disc brake test for TOUR 6/2014-> gave rise to fears of the worst: For comparison, we also tested one wheel with a carbon rim and one with a classic aluminium rim on a steep, winding descent. The frightening realisation: the carbon wheel was already broken by the heat of the brakes on the descent and did not even reach the final full braking position. Based on the data from this practical test - which cannot easily be repeated many times due to the high effort and risk for the test rider - we have developed a test for our laboratory test bench to find out whether the wheels in this test field can withstand such demands.
The complete test results of these carbon wheels can be found below as a PDF download:
- Campagnolo Hyperon Ultra
- DT Swiss Spline RC 28C
- Mavic Cosmic Carbone 40 Elite
- Reynolds aüAttack Clincher
- Xentis Squad 4.2 Clincher
- Zipp 202 Firecrest CCL
TOUR you can also order online.
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