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Old 07-15-12, 08:02 PM
  #7  
tsl
Plays in traffic
 
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Join Date: May 2006
Location: Rochester, NY
Posts: 6,971

Bikes: 1996 Litespeed Classic, 2006 Trek Portland, 2013 Ribble Winter/Audax, 2016 Giant Talon 4

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I own a 2006 Trek Portland that has over 13,000 miles on it. I had two sets of those wheels--one for the three-season tires and one for the studded snows.

I don't have a current product to offer, but this is my experience:

Trek warranteed each set twice before I got tired of the same old crappy wheels. But if you're putting only 200 miles a year on the bike (1,000 miles in five years?), you'll likely get another five years out of them. For that matter, if Trek won't warrantee yours, I still have a set I'd part with pretty cheap.

Strangely, it was easier to find disc-specific hoops a couple of year ago when I had mine built. (Story here.) Since then, Velocity discontinued the VXC rim I used. With new road disc bikes coming out you'd think you could find more wheels and rims these days, but they've pretty much dried up. Temporary I'm sure, but it doesn't help you today.

Velocity still sells--and I highly recommend--their 130mm road disc hub. I was told that one shouldn't cold set (that is, bend or force wider) an aluminum frame. Steel tolerates it, but aluminum apparently does not. This is before even considering any chainline issues a wider hub could introduce. I played it conservatively and stuck with the 130mm spacing.

I have nearly three years and about 5,000 miles on the "new" wheels I had built and they've still never needed to be trued, let along never having any spoke problems.
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