ADVICE ON HEAVY DUTY REAR WHEEL FOR 220LB.

[James Torrey]

I am looking for a Heavy duty 26" aluminum all mountain rear wheel that can take the abuse of my 220 lb. body and hard riding style.
I know that a wider wheel is better.
I know that a 36 spoke pattern may also help.
I ride all mountain on a hardtail frame with 135mm hub and 9mm skewers.
I need to keep price under or around $400
Stairs and curbs are common play in the city.
Can I upgrade to 10mm QR skewers in a larger hub with adaptors? Sun Ringle?
Any help with this choice is greatly needed and appreciated.
Thanks, James Torrey.

[gar29]

If you’re looking at Sun Ringle, maybe the Charger? I have an older set of Sun Ringles that I abused ruthlessly at that weight range. They’ve breathed a sigh of relief now that i’m down to 200…. Mavic DeeMax would be the ultimate way to go, but they would set you back about $600. My nephew, who is 300+ rides the crap out of his set FR & DH and has never had a problem. Might be able to pick up a used one for the price range?

You could also check out Southern Wheel Works. The owner is a long time member and contributor here. He does great work and could set up something specifically for your needs. His forum handle is dgaddis. You sure won’t lose anything shooting him an email and seeing what he can do for you.

[James Torrey]

Thanks for the info Gar…
I will contact Southern Wheel and see what i can do about ordering up a wheelset.
i used the wheel design tool at Universal Cycle; I designed a wheel with Sun Ringle aluminum 32 spoke wide body rims with Wheelsmith heavy gauge spokes, brass nipples, and CK heavy duty 12mm hub, this will set me back about 500 duckets for the rear wheel! So I guess I better drop down to that magic weight of 199 and see if I cant stop bending up rims!
Let you know what I come up with…
Flat rim James.
ps. love that ratcheting rear hub noise… does anyone else make a noisy hub that is not of pawl design?

[Dustin Gaddis]

Hey Gar – thanks for the plug man!

James – at 220lbs you’re really not what I would consider a heavy MTBer, most of the folks I build wheels for are around 200-220lbs. 32 double butted spokes on the right rim will be just fine for you. Alloy nipples would work fine too, unless you need the corrosion resistance of brass. Brass wouldn’t hurt of course, but it’s not necessarily required.

To recommend a good rim, tell me a little more about what sort of problems have you had with wheels in the past. Are they going out of true because the spokes are going loose? Are you tacoing wheels? Denting rims? Flat spoting rims?

And this is a disc brake wheel, correct?

As for the hubs, Kings are super nice and super durable, and expensive. Hope is a great lower cost alternative, they even have a stainless steel freehub body option (at no extra charge!) to prevent the cassette from gouging the freehub body, and they can be had with a 10mm thru-bolt end caps which would let you use the DT Swiss RWS Thru-Bolt skewer. Thru-bolts are sort of a halfway point between a QR and thru-axle – and they work in QR dropouts. They’re not quite as stiff as a real thru-axle, but they are an improvement over a QR axle. The Hope hub is pretty loud, which I think is a good thing 😆 It does use a pawl system, but it’s proven to be very reliable. The Hope would be a little over your $400 price. If you absolutely have to stay under $400, the DT Swiss 350 hub is a good choice. It uses the same Star Ratchet internals as the much more expensive 240S hubs, but it has a taiwan made hub shell that is slightly heavier and much less expensive. The DT hub is not available with a 10mm thru-bolt however, and the engagement is much slower than the Hope – 18 points vs 40 points. There is a 36T Star Ratchet upgrade available for the DT hub, but that would bring the price up equal to the Hope. The DT is available in black only, the Hopes come in several colors.

[Author]

Posts