compare and contrast the two wheel sets. what gains do you get from the ksyriums cf aksiums for the additional cost. looking for good quality road wheels for everything bar racing. what are people's experiences.

Not tried the Mavics but I'm very, very impressed with the Shimano RS80's

what is the cost of those?

Astonishingly high cost.

As far as I can see for the Ksyriums.

Then again, my brand new Aksium rear wheel had loose cartridge bearings out of the box and wasn't even particularly true. On face value, they seem to be pretty much the same design though, so presumably the Ksyriums are made with better quality materials and are finished better? Hmmmm…

Aksiums are awesomely reasonably(!) good value for money though.

I've got both.

The Aksiums are pretty much the same but for the heavier rim. You can't really feel a big difference when using them unless you're really going flat out and then you maybe feel the weight a little.

That said, I've only got them because I got them all silly cheap (from here!) and would be getting hand built wheels (Mavic open pro rims with DT revolution spokes and whatever hub fits your budget) if I was buying new as they're lighter for the money and easier to replace bits if you have any problems.

After recommendations on here pretty happy with these:

New Wheels – Shimano 105 Hubs – Mavic Open Pro Black

Thought about Ultegra hubs but the're about £100 more for a grey polish I reckon.

clubber – interesting, thanks. what hubs would you advise with open pros. I have wheelset of those with ultegra hubs but rims now concave and need replacing, hence my initial interest in the two wheelsets above.

Really depends on your budget…

Assuming you run Shimano then Ultegra are plenty good enough for almost anyone. Dura Ace are very nice but a lot of cash for relatively small weight saving. Other hubs like American Classic, CK, Hope, etc are all good too but again, it depends what you want to spend..

Since I run Campag, I tend to use their hubs but since you just need new rims, I'd personally just replace them with more Open Pros – if you don't know how to build wheels, now's a great time to learn – it's really not the black art that it seems and absolute worst case, just undo it all, take it to your LBS and get them to build them as you won't damage anything even if you do it wrong.

All you need here:
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/wheelbuild.html

I've got a set of Aksiums.
You can buy lighter wheels, but these are great unless you just want to own dearer wheels.
I've used mine for road racing, then a winter of reliability trials, training, some 'sportives' including a recent rough stuff one and next they're going on my crosser for the 2010 season.
They've not missed a beat and have remained true throughout.

That said once they're done I'm going to slowly change all my wheels to shimano/Mavic handbuilds.

My CX bike came with Aksiums fitted, they seem OK, and to be honest I can't see the point in spending any more (£189 a pair in my LBS) for CX wheels. It may be a different matter for road only use, but with the current state of the roads round here I'm not so sure.

[It may be a different matter for road only use, but with the current state of the roads round here I'm not so sure.]

Amen to that.

LOL yeah, true enough…

I use the Aksiums on my cross bike too.

There's a big difference, price, weight, strength and stiffness. But which Kyseriums? There are three different versions of Kyseriums, the Aksiums are a training wheel and Kyseriums are race wheel. Well that's the easist way to describe the difference.

What if you have a SRAM set-up, what hubs shouls you get then? Mixing groupsets on a road bike seems wrong, for some reason(!)

SRAM and Shimano are cross compatible so no issue there and SRAM/Shimano don't have the history of Campag so you're 'allowed' to mix 🙂