I have just built up a 2008 orange 5 and have sun ringle hubs with 721's. Do people consider these rims too heavy for trail riding? Have been considering changing for something like 819's or stans flow on pro 2's. I love the strength of the 721's but would i notice the weight difference?
Cheers

Unneccesarily heavy I'd say but not too heavy. I wouldn't use 'em myself though. Not convinced you'd be giving away any strength with a move to Flows… (Flows are stupidly strong for general trail riding too, Arch would make more sense but Flows tend to come in better value wheel builds)

I use Mavic 729's as I'm lardy and ride quite hard. Can't say I feel them over heavy and I guess they're heavier than 721's

I used to have 717's but I ALWAYS punctured at Innerleithen on my hardtail with 717's but don't on 729's.

Weight doesn't come into it. It's what is necessary.

I use a 721 on the front and have no problems with its weight. mtfu?

I'd say that that are much too heavy for trail riding, if they were any heavier then they would be only any good for mincing, like the 823's 😉 🙂

I had 721s on my stiffee for a while, they wore me down after a while so changed to 719s. I'm 75kg and try not to plough everything, 719s are still true.

Depends how you ride and how heavy you are really. I use on most of my bikes 721s for everything from XC to DH and jumping. I tend to find Rims under 500g are just not stiff enough for me so @ 570g they're reassuringly durable and build into stiff wheelsets.
but yes you should notice the weight difference if you dropped a hundred grams or so on each rim. to find out how much why not fit the lightest tubes you can find or lighter tyres?

I used to have 717's but I ALWAYS punctured at Innerleithen on my hardtail with 717's but don't on 729's

That has gotta be the stupidest reason for changing to a 1/2lb heavier rim I can think of.

would the wider rims not help there GW?

I have 721s on both my bikes – ones a single speed commuter.

So, no they certainly are not too heavy.

help in what way? As far as I'm aware a 12mm wider rim doesn't magically make the rider use an appropriate tyre pressure!

maybe the wider rim could make the tyre less prone to lateral movement or require more pressure to give the appearance of having enough air in it? I dunno GW, you'd know better than me mate 🙂

Thanks for your comments so far. I'm about 80kg and ride trails in the lakes as well as trail centres. I ride fairly smooth but do like to take on a few drops and jumps too so don't want to give up too much strength. I had the 721's on my previous frame (2008 attack trail) which was heavier and more downhill orientated so maybe suited the wheelset better. If they are overkill for my riding/frame i would probably try something tubeless ready so reccommendations welcome.

I used to have 717's but I ALWAYS punctured at Innerleithen on my hardtail with 717's but don't on 729's

That has gotta be the stupidest reason for changing to a 1/2lb heavier rim I can think of.

Proof = pudding, GW.

I pinch puncture less often with 729's ( or never since the change from 717's actually). This is why weight isn't an issue. If it was, I'd use road rims and tyres and stop every 10m and fix punctures.

I'm no lighter and certainly ride no slower or less hard.

Wider rims allow me to use wider tyres and so I pinch flat less often.

yes, I guess that's it.

From experience a 2.2-2.5 DH tyre on a 721 won't pinch any more than on a 729 if used at appropriate pressures for the terrain (Having used both rims extensively over a 10 year+ period racing/riding DH). personally I prefer the profile a 721 gives the tyre and the 721s are certainly not noticably weaker than their lardy cousins (infact I trashed more D321s(729s) than D521(721s)s over the years.

sounds like 719s might have been fine for you if all you wanted was to run a fatter tyre at a lower pressure.

I have a 721 on my hardtail and I use it for mainly trail riding, jumps and downhill.

It doesnt feel to heavy to me, just feels nice and solid and its lasted for ages

i cant help but read GW's posts in a naslly. whiny voice.

To the OP, do YOU consider them too heavy? Does it matter what folk on here think? Sounds like you like the strength, and they are not that heavy. Id stick with them.

I have a set on my DH bike, and il happily swap them over to my trail bike when i can afford a new set, probably lighter than my current hope pro2/321 + dmr/singletrack set up. But then i like to be able to ride stuff harder and would sacrifice a few grams for peice of mind any day of the week.

I use 321 on my bike don't feel heavy to me. And you can use a nice wide tyre

I have a d521 on the back and f519 on the front. Really dont notice any difference and strength or stiffness.

only thing is one is a touch wider but even with the same tyres on you cant tell much difference.

Whatever you go for, make sure its built well and enjoy.

If in doubt, go stronger 🙂

forgot to say im about 70 kg and ride average smoothness (word?) on trails and centers.

They are a wheel within a muddy tyres worth of weight of any other. My mate has 729 with dual plies on his Alpine 160 and beats me on my light wheeled 5 to the top and bottom of every hill.

if you are man enough to pedal them on every ride without wingeing then use them.

I use 823's which I like, why? because I do get piece of mind that they can take abuse, the occasional stupid hard landing and they have a nice wide profile, to be honest they aren't the lightest but then I'm not hung up on weight, I like to think of my bike as a big hammer that I can trust to not fail on me. Its all down to personal preference really. If it works for you then its good.

That said I'm toying with the idea of building up a light weight short travel full susser, which I'd probably stick 819's on.

I've got a set of 721s on bulbs and a set of 717s on bulbs and I can't really tell any difference in weight between the 2 sets.
The 721s will undoubtly be stronger though.

Wider rims will give a tyre (slightly) more volume, which will help avoid pinch punctures.

I used them for ages, great rims and notiably stiffer than the en321's they were replaced with.

Heavy, yes.
Too heavy, naaaa, thats what halo combat rims are for!

Stan's scare me, if it really was possible to build a rim that wide and that light and that strong, why did mavic not do it 10+ years ago when they designed their rims? Plenty of WC DH riders on mavic en321's (the 'cheep' enduro rim) but none on stan's?

Wider rims will give a tyre (slightly) more volume, which will help avoid pinch punctures.

Negated by the tyre profile on a wider rim – easier to get pinch flats.

Are you able to say the effects exactly cancel out?

I'm not sure that I can. I suspect that due to the 'progressive' nature of air compression, that the increase in volume will be more important than the reduction in width.

Can't really prove it though.

721's are fine.

much heavier/stronger than you need though for 'trail riding'

(they're great for Dh racing)

yes, you will notice the difference with lighter rims.

Tough call to calculate poppa, perceived wisdom (to me) is that pinch flats happen more with wider rims.

721 user here, mostly XC nowadays in the pentlands, though if i get to go to trail centres and abroad i like to ride hard. i do fine on them but if i had the cash i'd be getting a lighter rim, at least on the back…

Experience takes the win over armchair speculation then 😉

Oi! I at least gave it some thought!

I wasn't taking the p1ss, I genuinely meant it! Innappropriate use of winking smiley maybe. Oh well.

Bit heavy for a 5 in my opinion, Hope Hoop Flow/Pro 2s would be a very good choice.

I have a set on my big bike and have they've been marvellous so far. Certainly strong enough for trail riding.

I went for EX721s on my new bike (Stiffee) as I'm 17st and tend to like smashing over stuff. They don't seem overly heavy to me and I ride up as much as down. The width seems to make tyres less prone to tipping over too.