I recently moved to a new place and cobbles are quite common around here. Some of them are bad, I had an unfixable puncture on my road bike already.
I use my hardtail as a commuter, and it has Stan’s Arch Mark 3 rims mated to XTR M9000 hubs. Not the fanciest wheels, but quality wheels. Importantly, I frequently (5–6 days a week) pull a bike trailer across said cobbles with good speed and this is the result:
My rim is cracked around almost every spoke on the drive side! Cobbles are a test for bike equipment, ugh. In the short term, my LBS will take my XTR hub and mate it to rims made for cargo bikes. The rim only costs 40 € …
Now I am thinking: once I replace my current bike with a gravel bike, what rims should I get? In the near future I won’t need to pull a trailer as often (1–2 times a week), but I want to have rims that can handle the abuse. Do you have some suggestions? I think I have the following requirements:
One side if me says that pros ride Roubaix on carbon rims, so just get another set.
Then the other side says “yeah, well they probably never use those rims again, so who cares if they trash them?”
Since you have to actually pay for rims, I’d take a peek at HED Emporia GA wheels…alloy, hooked rims, 25mm IW and reasonably light (but definitely not “lightweight”).
I have RaceFace ARC 25 offset rims on my commuter/cargo/chariot bike and often ride in the woods over fist sized gravel or roots and never had a problem in 4 years, either pulling the thule chariot or riding with my now almost 4yrs old son on the rideshotgun seat. Systemweight is well above 125kg and never thought about the wheels or rims. They’ve been bombproof.
While this is a good point, I’ve found that the durability of carbon rims is better than aluminum, for mtb and gravel. I’ve wrecked my fair share of aluminum rims, and good carbon ones have definitely been more durable. I can’t say if they’ve been more durable than the price difference, but if you need to pay someone to re lace your wheels, that adds substantial cost to rim failure.
I agree that a robust gravel wheel is worth it though, definitely go with a robust build for peace of mind
I have been incredibly happy with these hunt wheels. Plenty of NWA gravel races and mostly riding on MTB trails and hitting jumps. Im not sure of riding prettty much any line on them.
When my MTB broke, I only had my gravel bike for several weeks. I did install cush core with the 45c when i started using the gravel bike as my do everything bike. I bought the extra warranty for piece of mind.
The only negatives i found online before purchase were from one guy who clearly ran ultra low pressure, and another annoying engineer complaining about bearing quality.., which is a wear item I am not worried about since Ive shredded the first set bearings in 2 of my 4 sets of i9 hubs within low miles. its part of the game. But these have held up! I would run them on an MTB if I needed to.
The other point is I have never been impressed by Stan’s durability. I’ve had bad experiences with rims and hubs, and you can do better with alloy on durability in my experience. Mavic and DT Swiss were both better for me
Those rims just are not that robust. When you can easily find a youtube video of the exact same failure, you have a Stans problem not a cobble problem. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6YFSw2xrpc
Don’t get super lightweight rims for your gravel bike and you will be fine.
If you have a good local shop that you trust - I would go on their recommendation. But any average mtb rim should be able to handle cobbles. I haven’t used aluminum rims in years, so don’t have any direct experience, but hear good things about Race Face, DT, and WTB.
Wheels, frames, and handlebars are things I’ll only buy from big brands who take quality seriously (ie- they have a lot to lose). I’ve had good luck with zipp wheels with a couple very old sets of 404 FC’s (no issues) and went with 303 FC’s for my gravel bike (and I also use them for road). I’ve only had them ~2.5 years, but they have over 20k miles on them and have been beat to hell with no issues other than having to replace a crappy stock bearing. I know there are cheaper wheels that probably perform the same or better, but I’ve gotten my $'s worth out of my zipps many times over and just feel a little safer riding a wheel from a big brand.
I’m beyond please with my Reserve wheel sets with DT Swiss 350 hubs. I have a set for gravel and enjoyed them so much that I bought a second road wheel set.
They have a lifetime warranty that includes crash replacements. I’m only 71kg, but the fact they also have no rider weight limits also tells me that they really stand by their wheels. The shop I bought them from said they prefer the wheels and dealing with Reserve far more than Zipp or Enve.
I highly recommend Corimas. They aren’t the most “modern” in terms of internal width, but they are bombproof. I have the G30.5s, which have since been replaced by the Essentia 40s.
I got tired of replacing the rear wheel on my MTB every other month, on average, so I went carbon. 4 years later, I have broken one, and it was a fluke accident, and Raceface replaced it free (also my first front failure).
With decent AL wheelsets being close to the price of cheap carbon ones, Id go with a cheap carbon wheelset for durability. You can beat a carbon rim in a way that you just can’t beat an AL one. The cheaper, generic rims are usually OVER built compared to the lighter and brand name ones. A shallower XC rim (16- 21mm deep higher spoke count) will give you some compliance compared to a (25mm+ , 24 spoke) gravel one.
