Help Deciding on Wheels (rim width)

Equipment
1

Buying some 650b wheels for my gravel bike and could use some help. Looking at the Reynolds ATR or the ICAN G25. The Reynolds are significantly discounted and I would go that route, but they only have an inner rim width of 23. The ICANs are hookless and 25mm. I’m going to be running 2.2 inch race kings or 2.1 inch thunderburts on this bike. Does the 2mm internal rim width make a big difference?

2

Have you see the Enve AG 650 wheels at bike closet? If I was buying 650, I’d definitely get those. Super sale.

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3

The 25mm rims would be better than the 23mm rims, but I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference riding them. The only thing would be the nagging thought that I should have gotten the 25mm rims.

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4

Thanks for the heads up here. That’s a great deal. I only wish they were a little deeper but that probably is a wash with them being lighter and having better hubs.

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5

one way to quantify the difference is by using zipp’s tire pressure calculator to see how much lower pressure you can use by having a rim that’s 23mm versus 25mm.

6

Good place to add to the discussion, I’ve been looking at Hope’s gravel offerings but they’re narrower than the most discussed “go wider” wheels at 19mm internal (which I think is the most common normal standard size?) and 26.5mm external width

Will be running 40mm - 45mm tyres for a bit of everything, my current rims are H son Hyrda which are 20mm internal and 25mm external.

Too narrow for an upgrade? Is the external the bit that should be wider? 19mm looks to be an official ETRTO standard?

7

Disliked the 19mm internal Hope alloy version of these, the Five20.

After many years of use, have recently binned the rims, kept the hubs and rebuilt around a 25mm ID and much happier for it. That’s for 35c tyres.

8

I would avoid those at all cost.

No price is good enough to go back to 2015.

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9

Thanks for both opinions, the lovely hubs can’t overcome the rims then!

Think Hunt fits the bill at a similar price and much wider.

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10

I’ve a few Hope hub wheelsets now, nearly all competitively priced against off the shelf generic hub wheelsets (not that this means they are bad… just not anodised bling).

If you’re willing to seek out the rims yourself and know a decent wheel builder willing to work with a mix of their own stock and your parts… and deal with all the logistical faff and time… you can have nice wide carbon on lovely hubs for the same or less.

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Marginal gains… I would not fuss about the 2mm difference. Don’t get bogged down in the minutia , buy the one that works best for whatever criteria is most important for you

12

I mean that’s the problem! The 3 or 4 choices are close but all are different!

  • Hunt - modern width and ratchet freehub but about a third of the chat online says you’ll be taking advantage of their good waranty
  • Hope - brilliant hubs that last forever but narrow retro rims that are narrower than my current alloy
  • Stayer - Hope hubs again but they’re a bit deeper than planned at 45mm and are secondhand from ebay
  • Chinese brands - ebay and a couple of hundred quid cheaper but much lower quality hubs and no customer service (and unlikely).

Too much choice!