I’m thinking about a new set of wheels and have been looking at Lightbicyle rims but I’m having a hard time convincing myself that there’s an obvious benefit over aluminum rims. Plenty of people on here seem to have had a good experience with them so they must have benefits aside from looking great and providing less rotating mass.So what are the advantages and can they really stand up to rock strikes, drops etc?

In my experience, no.

Cracked a light bicycle rim in 2 places on the first ride and they wouldn’t entertain a warranty claim.

ICAN fat bike wheels here. Bought 90mm wide carbon wheel set and they are ace.

Lighter than aluminium equivalents with the bonus that the carbon ones are tubeless where the all ones are full of cut outs.

ICAN were great to deal with.

Reckon it depends on why you’re buying them.

You can buy properly light aluminium wheel sets for half the price of a carbon set. American Classic comes to mind. And some carbon wheels — particularly those made to be ‘strong’ — aren’t that light.

So is it down to ‘feel’ as some of the magazine ‘experts’ claim? To decide whether you like that ‘feel’ you’ll have ride some. No way round that I’m afraid.

I can see the attraction of carbon wheels, but until Enve drop their prices by 50%, aluminium is a smarter choice for me.

They are stiffer. Whether that’s a good thing or not is open for debate. For me, it’s not – it would appear others are starting to feel the same way too. Racers running them are trying to introduce ways of bringing some flex back into wheels & i’ve seen some reviews popping up recently of bikes coming with carbon wheels complaining the wheels are too stiff.

They probably make more sense on a 29″ I think.

They can be lighter, I would imagine again for a 29″. For me on a 650b bike racing DH/Enduro, etc they don’t actually end up any lighter than a decent aluminium wheelset.

Strength – well, in 10 years i’ve wrecked 2 aluminium rims. In 2 years of various carbon rims, i’ve now broken 8. I’ve given up with them & put them on my wife’s bike.

If it’s general trail riding, they should be fine. But for harder riding and racing with a gravity bias, on my test sample basis, they simply arn’t up to the job.

So, obvious benefit? Other than their wallet emptying abilities – no, in my opinion.

They are not really any better. I have light bicycle ones and I also have some mavic 821’s. I purely bought the carbon ones because of the cool factor and because they look good. I don’t need any more reason than that.

Basically you can get very wide rims for the weight of your existing rims. Then its all down to discussion about wide wheels more so than carbon. Depends if you care about extra weight you’ll incur getting wide rims without carbon.

Regardless of any actual benefits provable or otherwise I can’t move past the cost aspect, rims to me are a consumable part and by their very nature will suffer damaging impacts, I can’t bring myself to spend carbon money on them, but then I also won’t spend stans money on them either.

If there was no cost difference then I’d be well up for the lighter weight/more width at same weight, although not totally sold on the stiffness angle, either way at the moment for me it comes down to cost, but if you are in a position to afford them then I’d say to for it, see how you get on with them as the only real downsides are cost and potentially them feeling too stiff, but you may or may not care about that and to some degree can be compensated for.

Depends how you ride. For XC racing they are noticeably stiffer under sprinting acceleration and in corners compared to aluminium rims of the same weight, like Crests. Yes, if you run your tyres soft and bottom out on the rim you might crack one, whereas you’d dent an alloy rim, but that’s the risk. The benefits are nothing to do with weight, it’s all about stiffness compared to a like for like alloy rim.

Interesting to see Am Classic recommended – everything I’ve seen of those says rims made of cheese and unreliable freehub drive…

For another view of Light Bikes – I discovered my bead hook had cracked after about 8 months of use and they just sent me another one, no problem.

I wouldn’t bother with ENVE – the LB ones are 1/6 of the price and the stiffness is the same (that I can feel anyway). These days I always order a spare rim (so I order 3 rims) in case I crack one and need a quick rebuild whilst I wait for their warranty replacement to arrive.

Lighter than aluminium equivalents with the bonus that the carbon ones are tubeless where the all ones are full of cut outs.

This is what’s selling them to me, for the fat bike at least. The next lightest rims are (I think) the DT BR710, which although is probably better than some of the budget wheels at going tubeless, still doesn’t have the twin-wall construction that makes normal width rims a doddle. And is full of holes so you need at least something to act as a rim strip.

So 680g + tubeless conversion + added faff that the bead still isn’t particularly supported against burping.

Vs

630g + valve

Cost is about £200 more though. But still saving about 200g, assuming about 50g of tape per DT rim, no doubt some people use less, or actual fat bike rim strips cost considerably more. But I’d probably pay the £200 just for the guarantee that the tubeless will be reliable.

Direct comparison; my Lightbicycle 26ers are pretty much the same weight as my Roval Traversees, and they’ve proved hugely stronger. I asked them do the same job, in the hemlock, riding the same trails (I did get faster mind), one set worked flawlessly and the other gave up completely after 6 months. It’s just fitness for purpose at that point, light alu rims aren’t fit for that purpose but carbon proved to me it was. (obviously other alu rims exist but don’t consider this a criticism of those old traversee els, they’re excellent wheels, still would be today) A Flow and Flow ex proved similiarly inadequate, a WTB i25 could handle it but weighed about 115g more and was narrower.

That’s a 385g, 30mm inside diameter rim, so it’s kind of impossible to compare with alu competitors, there aren’t any. Pacenti TL28 is maybe the closest, and achieves that weight by being made of wet cardboard.

I had an LB rim which I broke, it was a replacement for the alu rim on one of those traversees- a 330g carbon rim so again, there’s no alu rim I could have chosen for that job, simple as that. A Stans Olympic 🙂 It cracked after 2 years hard use in the hardtail including enduro races, a fort william uplift and a bunch of other uplifts elsewhere, a bit of service in the full suss for some SES and one EWS round. I broke it by clumsily dropping onto a sharp rock at bikeparkwales, it could have broken a dh rim tbf, totally my fault. But I still rode around on the cracked rim for the rest of the week- afan, cyb etc, I’d have happilly kept going if I’d not had a spare wheel to throw in when I got home. You couldn’t ask more.

Now I’m not the hardest or fastest rider so maybe you could do the same and run into issues, but I’m comparing with my other wheels doing the same.

I don;t personally feel any difference in feel, not to say there isn’t one but if there is, it doesn’t matter to me.

So then the question is, how much heavier and narrowers am I willing to go to get otherwise equivalent performance? I reckon width aside, mine are pretty comparable to my excellent WTB Frequency i25s at 500g dead. Maybe the EX471 at 475g, I’ve not used those but they do look ace. Not Stans, I killed a Flow and a Flow Ex establishing that.

Not everyone cares about a bit of weight. I do, I’m a weenie and I love the feel of a light shoed bike, I don’t like heavy tyres either when I can avoid it but ymmv. So it’s not a simple value consideration, for a lot of people it just doesn’t make sense. For others, they can get away with weaker rims than I can so alu becomes a better option

When I retired the 26er I went straight out and bought 29er LB rims; I don’t expect to regret that but you never know!

I’ve been running a set of lb 29er rims for 2 years now, and no problems. Same weight as the really light DT xc rims they replaced, and a lot stiffer. Previously I could really feel the rear wheel flex in berms, and I’ve had no problems with there strength.
A mate did break one, he manualled into a water bar at 40mph, completely smashing the rim. It would have destroyed any rim, sent some pictures to lb, and they sent him a new rim.

Beaten to it… but I’ll answer anyway.

XC 29ers – Yes I would.

Rocks, drops and riding in the mountains – I’ll stick with alu, ta.

Oh aye, I meant to add- that one I killed, was their “old process” way of making the rims, apparently a lot weaker than the current one- more sections, oldschool beadhooks etc. It was out of warranty when I broke it and besides that, obviously not a warranty job but they gave me a discount towards the 29er set I have now anyway. Nice touch.

Yeh I think they’ve changed the build over the last few years, the lips or the hookless part whatever the term for it is are thicker than they were.

For me it’s been a huge success. Lighter, wider and massively stronger. Tubeless is a doddle.

Yes, I broke one and it was warranty’d without fuss but since then they continue to take abuse that would kill alu rims or at least give them flat spots and ruin their tubeless set-up.

They allow me to run proper tyres that are 1kg+ which is real peace of mind for a big ride out or race weekend.

What about Easton arc rims or wheels??
I’ve just got a set f rims o hope hubs! Only a few rides on them but seem pretty robust. Once taped maxxis tyres went on easy enough tubeless and they do seem stiff to me any way.
Think there 475g for a 27.5 rim in 27mm internal width.

In looking at the Arcs, on pro 2 as well. Can’t justify the carbon cost at all.

What ever happened to magnesium rims?

you can get very wide rims for the weight of your existing rims

this. wide rims make tires amazing

Ive got a set of Easton Haven carbon 26 and there is a massive difference over the aluminium ones I swapped them out for. 1400g the pair, massively stiff, turning and acceleration blew my mind. Ive ridden them through hundreds of rocky descents including rim dinger in BPW and have had loads of rock strikes and while there are cosmetic damage, thats all it is. No gouges to speak of, not even light scratch. They are bomb proof.

It all depends on the quality of the wheels you buy I suppose, obviously lower end carbon wheels are not going to perform any where near as good as the higher end models. So if your going to compare ali to carbon then the quality has to be there from the start or its pointless.

Ive been looking at a set of American Classic Carbonators in a 27.5 as I cant afford forking out for the Eastons again. They look awesome and are a great weight. And American Classic make quality wheels so cant see these disappointing at all.

What ever happened to magnesium rims?

given how soft Mg is and how susceptible Mg pedals are to damage I wouldn’t touch an Mg rim. Maybe the industry decided likewise!

Basically you can get very wide rims for the weight of your existing rims. Then its all down to discussion about wide wheels more so than carbon. Depends if you care about extra weight you’ll incur getting wide rims without carbon.

Which also remains to be decided whether it’s a ‘benefit’ or just a case of emperor’s new clothes.

given how soft Mg is and how susceptible Mg pedals are to damage I wouldn’t touch an Mg rim. Maybe the industry decided likewise!

I dunno, Insense (well Sun Ringle) made the Mag 30 DH rim, so it must have been pretty tough, never see it used for XC though.

Shows how cyclical things are, early 2000’s it was all Mag 30’s and Michelin 2.8 tyres in DH. Now it’s 30mm rims and 2.8 tyres in trail riding, marketed as if it’s in some way new! Remember that in the next “what’s the point of +plus tyres, I’ll only ride them when they prove they’re worthwhile and win a world championship” thread/rant. The answer is probably there.

Hob Nob – Member

Which also remains to be decided whether it’s a ‘benefit’ or just a case of emperor’s new clothes.

Also depends on your tyre choice tbh! There was a pinkbike article about width that used hans dampfs to illustrate how tyre shape improves with rim width and I was almost screaming “That’s because they’re shite! You’re just using expensive rims to make them the same shape good tyres are on narrow rims!”

I do think wider is better tbh. There’ll be a point where that stops being true mind you but I don’t think it’s less than 35mm. But it’s not such a big deal, my spare wheels are 22.5mm DTs and I’m perfectly happy riding those too.

TINAS,
The ICAN rims are twin wall. I used small squares of tape over the spoke holes and they are holding air as tubeless just fine.

DT Swiss BR710 are very light… then add a rim strip, add a tube… or o go tubeless, add tape, foam, faff….

I saved over 1kg an ed with a carbon wheel set.

Can you get the ican rims as a standalone? I was googling about and I could only find them in the full builds, but I’ve got some DT350 hubs for em…

I can’t see any advantage per-say to “wide” rims in isolation. In all cases, the best rim/tyre combo will the rim/tyre combo designed to be used together (ie, the rim/tyre combo that optimises the tyre profile, both statically and dyanmically)

i.e. If tyres are designed for wide rims, then chances are, those tyres will work well on wide rims.

When it comes to carbon rims, i’m not decided. If you’ve spent your cash on everything else, then sure, spend some on carbon rims, but imo, you’re better spending the money on other stuff first! (like decent tyres or drivetrain or damping or a dropper etc etc)

Right so, apart from looking bling the main benefit seems to be the ability to run wider wheels without a weight penalty, strength and durability don’t seem to be too much of an issue (accepting that some have had problems). So the benefits of running a wider rim, I’m guessing traction and stability in turns, Anything else I could expect?

thisisnotaspoon – Member
What ever happened to magnesium rims?

They briefly flared? 🙂

I have reservations about carbon rims, which is odd because I’m quite happily riding around on a carbon fork.

The reservations are mainly that the cheaper ones look like someone has taken a mould of an alloy rim rather than designed them for the material – eg no reinforcement around the spoke holes, they’re just drilled vertically through thin carbon.

The appeal to me is wide rims at the weight of a skinny Mavic. I like big tyres and wide rims make them work better.

I have carbon fatbike rims, but I have ordered a set of BR710s for my main fatbike. (I use tubes, so I’m not worried about the tubeless faff stuff.)

33mm Lightbike 26″on my SX, very happy with them, never touched a spoke on them and the tyre profile with dirty dans and HR2 is very much more grippy than my Mavics were. I run relatively high psi though.

I went for Roval Fattie SL carbon set up may last year, a week in the highlands battering them doing Torridon & the like didn’t bother them, I instantly felt a more precise steering feel faster acceleration & the bike just carries far more speed, not a single issue with them, pricey yes but very happy, oh & tyres depending on make can be a bith to mount but easy to seal.

All that said they are very stiff & lack feel / comfort, must be my age… I have a pair of DT240s on i25KOM’s 650B & they are much more comfortable on long days out.

Still I’m keen to build a pair 29er carbon wheels as I have a spare set of DT240s hubs so currently looking at several manufacturers, a new build hightower frame has just arrived & awaits my grubby fingers on it’s shiny red paint.

I’ve recently gotten the ibis 741s. 35mm internal / 41mm external. I cannot believe the difference they make with traction and, therefore, confidence. Now, I can’t say that the difference is down to them being carbon but they’re super light for the size of them. For carbon wheels, they’re fairly good value, not the cheapest but far from the expensive end. I’m not a fantastic rider but they’ve given me the confidence to ride stuff I’d previously avoided or minced down because the traction is that good. I’ve not put the stickers on them so they’re certainly not bling.

FWIW the new DT Swiss XMC 1200 look like a decent set of wheels and again decent value price point. They don’t seem to be widely available yet though.

What is the best place to get Ican rims from? ebay? I guess you then have to add 20% of vat to the price.

LB 35mm rims for me. My sole purpose was to get a better tyre profile and more volume at the same weight as my previous ALU rims. In practice, I gained 7mm internal width on the rim and a significant uplift in tyre volume and a squarer tyre profile, which I prefer, for a touch less weight. Nothing in ALU was comparable two years ago, and only now, things like the latest Stans flow are only beginning to come close, but are still heavier and doubtlessly build into a wheel that is weaker and more flexible.

So, lighter for a given width. As a structure, both stiffer and stronger than ALU, but as a material, softer and less tough. This puts a premium on edge protection in the system since they do generally seem a bit more vulnerable to rock strikes. I’ve put the original weight saving back into tougher tyres with thicker sidewalls, the net effect of which is to give me a wheelset of similar weight to my historic ALU ones, with more capability for grip and tougher.

Whether you’re prepared to pay the premium is up to you. Given the price of some of these wider ALU rims, there’s not that much of a jump to importing your own carbons from LB.

This is a picture of my first LB rim breakage after 2 years. It’s my fault I was running about 12psi. You can see the chip where the rock started the failure if you look close. Despite this, I rode the rest of the day on it, it still holds air tubeless, and its still round and true. I have a replacement coming, but I have every intention of repairing this one when it’s off the bike.

The reservations are mainly that the cheaper ones look like someone has taken a mould of an alloy rim rather than designed them for the material – eg no reinforcement around the spoke holes, they’re just drilled vertically through thin carbon

This is a bit silly really. The pull through force they will take is higher than the breaking strain of a typical, decent spoke anyway. Arguably, that good enough.

I’ve clattered my LB 35mm 29er rims off most of the rocks in the Dark Peak for a year or so now, they’re still holding up very nicely – obviously my amazing wheelbuilding skills are a major part of that though 😉 . I’m not a massively heavy rider but I do have an unerring ability to smack the back end into anything remotely square or pointy on the trail, and have dinged loads of alloy rims over the years. The LBs are still true and in perfect nick apart from the odd very minor scuff.

Reynolds carbon MTB rims are reasonably strong – I did two weeks in the Alps on the 29er version and they were fine. The Industry9 hubs they were attached to were terrible though…

Smashed my rear LB 35MM rim last year while running 30psi in a thick 1.5ply tyre (was riding in Torridon and was happy to loose some grip for peace of mind). I was around 70kg at the time.

Contacted LB all they offered was $10 of a new set of rims.

Front rim has been fine, but I’ll stick with cheap alloy rims for the rear I think.

but I’m having a hard time convincing myself that there’s an obvious benefit over aluminum rims

That’s because there largely isn’t one…But y’know; it’s your money, if you want carbon rims; go for it.