USAZorro

Had those on my '78 Super Course back in the day. Never had issues with them then (though I weighed maybe 125). I think 90 psi was about what they were good for. Can't let pressure get too low in them though, as they are very susceptible to pinch flats at lower pressures - as I found out years (and pounds) later.

Drillium Dude

I have a black-anodized pair, with eyelets, for sale now if anyone is still looking for some.

DD

Rocky Gravol

I didn't notice that there were eyeleted and non-eyeleted,
until some dude pointed out that the wheels on my bike didn't match.

noglider 

Meh. But what was your question?

MeadMan2

Go to an auto parts store & get some Blue Magic metal polishing cream. Takes some work but they will come out as thought they were chrome plated. Years ago I bought a wheel with a concave with no eyelets, laced to a 1954 alloy SA, which I now use on my Armstrong. I use it for the Lake Pepin 3 Speed Tour with a Conti Ultra Sport 700x28 @ 85psi with no problem.

sunvalleylaw

Zombie up! Just got a bike with A124's! Had to join in! Trying to decide on tires for them. Mine are 700c. Would like to go up to 35c, with a tire that can handle some dirt road use, but is primarily a great roller.








The bike is essentially a barn find. Will take some clean up. Will ride these wheels for a while to make sure I like them. As I said, I want to do a little dirt road riding, and commuting/touring. The lack of bead thing has me a bit nervous. But, will just try it for a while.

79pmooney

I still have one. Those rims were not light but very, very stiff. Saved my a** once. Town line sprint. I went early, coming off a small hill. Got passed by the local hotshot, a good racer, with a strong "rookie" on his wheel. The hotshot swerved hard in front of me to shed the rookie. He came over too. Suddenly I had a rear wheel where my front belonged while I was doing well over 30. I leaned my wheel into his and pushed. A huge ripping of spokes (from his quick release). I came off his wheel, my tire hitting the far forkblade and taking off the paint but my bike was upright. Rolled to a stop. 8 consecutive spokes cut out, others (on both sides) damaged.

That the wheel stayed true enough to be ridable, leave me and the half dozen riders behind unscathed is testimony to that stiffness. (This happened when my custom Peter Mooney was still brand new.)

Oh the lack of bead: I don't know if I have ever run folding tires on them, probably not. I certainly never adhered to any maximum tire pressure, pumping up whatever tires I was using to appropriate road pressures, close to 100 psi. (Didn't have a gauge but Zephal HPs did 120 easily.)

With no bead, the practice I do with all clinchers is a little more important. I put in about 20 pounds, hold the wheel up to the light, spin it and watch the molded line above the bead, checking to see that it is uniform height off the rim. Last I look at the tread to see that it is tracking straight with no humps or low. A tire that passes this simple test is very unlikely to blow off any rim unless the tire is simple a very loose fit.

Ben

TiHabanero

The A124 rim is the toughest road rim I have ever used. Heavy and no apologies. They came on my 1976 Schwinn Super Sport. Crash worthy, abuse worthy, and tour worthy. Good rim.

Pompiere

My wife's 1988 Schwinn Traveler has 415X concave rims. They are the narrowest rims I have seen with a Schrader valve, which makes mounting tires a pain.

sunvalleylaw

So for those that are running still 700c A124's, what tires are you favoring? I am particularly interested in a touring tire that can do some dirt road too. Probably not worried about any sort of "real" cross use. I would like to be in the 32c - 35c range. Light is nice, but I don't suppose it matters that much since the rims are heavy. Still, no need to add a whole lot of extra rolling weight. The builder of my bike suggested Contis of some kind.

Bobtoo

Gottem on my 1982 Dawes Super Galaxy.




I like them but they are a pain to keep clean, especially if it was raining on your last ride and all the water runs down to the bottom of the wheel.

tiredhands 

I've got some laced to Superbe hubs for my partner's Mother's Day gift. I'm banking on their strength, as this Le Tour is slated to have a kid seat in the back once the kid is old enough for it.
Untitled by D Russell, on Flickr

Akkorn

Gottum on my 83 Motobecane Grand Touring I'm in the process of restoring.

FBinNY 

Actually this revival of a zombie thread begs the question ------ What's the BF record for raising the dead?

Namely, what's the longest time interval between the last post of an old thread, and the date of it's 2nd life?

noglider 

Congratulations on your baby, @tiredhands. Nice work on the bike. If I may make a suggestion, the rider may like the saddle tipped up. Those saddles are like that. They have to look uncomfortable to be comfortable. Maybe tip the handlebars down a bit, too.

tiredhands 

Thanks! Yeah, it needs a few fitment tweaks, including trying to silence the Mafac brakes. I found the wheelset in a friend's shed, the hubs were in superbe condition but I had to replace the spokes on the rear as the PO had laced them in 4 cross and they were twisted and broken. As it was my first time trying my hand at lacing a wheel I went to the lbs to get spokes measured and cut and the wheel smith assumed I wanted to replace the rim with "another cheap box rim." I guess not everyone shares the same appreciation for rehabbing quality, if admittedly outdated, design.

sunvalleylaw

Anyone ever try to set these up tubeless? Seems like you could.

ollo_ollo

Read this thread with my morning coffee then began cleaning wheels on my recently purchased 1975 Grand Jubile Mixte, so noticed it has Weinmann Convex (raised) rims. Probably equally strong and heavy as the concave rims.

I have seen the concave on many bikes, even had a set on a Grand Touring, now long gone. Also have a concave wheelset on the Motobecane Super Mirage parts bike I purchased for the Klunker Challenge, but I have only ever seen 1 other set of the Convex : A Japanese copy of the convex Weinmann rim/Normandy hub wheels. The copies are Araya light alloy on Shimano copies of Normandy hubs. They have been around so long, I forget where or how I got them. Weinmann must have made quite a few though, for Araya to copy them. Here are a couple pics

ThermionicScott 

I've seen a couple that were 10 years or more. In theory, it could be up to something like 13 or 14 years now, right?

In a lot of subforums, it's annoying when a newbie obliviously bumps an ancient thread and tries to engage with long-gone members, but in C&V there is often interesting new content so the value of the thread keeps going up.

* Realizing that this reply itself is to a zombie, but I wanted to chime in.

Ferrouscious 

I really like the look of thems rims. The day of the dead is today.

dddd

I also remember Concave rims as tough and heavy.
The one other thing I noticed was that the OEM versions could be different from the aftermarket ones that you might order out of a catalog.
Anodized or not, eyeletted or not, and some on Raleighs had the rim joint apparently welded instead of pinned, and with the rim sidewalls over-machined local to the joint, causing an incredibly high magnitude braking pulsation.
So I would be wary of the welded variants at least, unless they are on a bike that can be test-ridden to assure smooth braking!

rhm

The rear wheel on my Counterpoint Opus II tandem is a 48h Phil Wood hub with a 27" Weinmann concave rim. It's a good wheel .. but being limited by the 6 speed freewheel and 27" tires, I'm planning to build a new wheel, cassette hub and 700c.

I actually have a 700c Weinmann Concave rim, 48h, NOS, that would suit. But is a non-hooked rim a good idea?

crank_addict

A welcomed zombie thread.

In a similar situation with an early Santana. Current 27 inch (48 spoke / Phil hubs) have been bulletproof but I've become a snob in finding a decent pair of replacement tires.

Also have three 700c Weinmann concave in 36 spoke laced (Phil rear and a pair of Maillard - w/ Heliomatic). Not fully convinced yet but have considered making a matched wheelset using Phil hubs.

Regardless of rim safety lip, I prefer a wired bead tire on the tandem as I've experienced a few blowouts.

non-fixie 

Not entirely sure yet. Vittorio was apparently a fan and supplied many a touring bike with these rims, including our tandem. Too many spokes to count. I replaced the original Schwalbe 'truck tires' it came with with 35mm Pasela wire beaded tires. Had one blow off in no time. Refitted it and paid (even) more attention to the seating. It has stayed on since, but I need more miles on it to be confident that it actually was a user error. The Vittorio endorsement is to be taken seriously, though, so I will keep trying.

JaccoW

I would consider them semi-hooked. I've been running modern tyres on them for a while now without any issues. Granted, they are "truck tyres"

Compare that to these: