When I first wrote the follow update extract I clearly had a similar disconnect between what Velocity cited as their rim weights for the Deep-V and what three spare rims I had on hand weighed. Although Velocity never offered an explanation as to why, the rims they were producing in the Spring of 2008 did, it turns out, weigh in at the lighter claimed weight. Admittedly, the Deep-V rims I hand on hand were produced back around 2002 and 2004, so it was assumption that something with the extrusions had changed.
It makes me wonder if your supplier didn't get his hands on some new-old-stock (NOS) rims?
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From my March 16, 2008 Calfee Journal Update...
As you can see, this Deep-V weighs in at 577 grams, which is consistent with two other spares I have here at the house. I recently sent a note to Velocity USA to mention that the Deep-V rim weights listed on their Web site seemed a bit on the low side @ 520 grams compared to the last five that I'd purchased which weigh in at 577 grams.
I also shared a Web site that depicted my 3 rims sitting on a calibrated scale.
The Velocity rep stated he'd pulled a silver anodized Deep-V rim off the shelf and weighed it to be 522 grams. He went on to note the anodized and machined rims would have different weights than, say, powder coated and non-machined rims, and that the number of spoke holes also factored into the rim's weight. However, to establish the catalog weight they randomly pulled a number of different Deep-V rims to come up with the average weight and that average is purportedly what they based their catalog weight against.
The latter was interesting, but it seemed to ignore the point that my three (3) 577 gram Deep-Vs with their anodized with machined sidewalls still falls well off the "average". I would note that someone from the Hobbes list had just recently purchased a pair of silver Deep-V rims with 24h spoking where the rims weigh 525 grams and 530 grams, respectively. Therefore, I must conclude that what Velocity is using is the average weight of the base-model / silver rims and not an average of rims that represent the full line.
May '08 Update: We received our new set of White Ind / Velocity Deep-V wheels in May and the spare rim weighed in at 520 grams on the dot. So, it would appear the current Deep-Vs are per spec, which is a good thing.