I'm in the market for a set of wheels, and it seems that quite a few of the "factory" wheels are out of stock. Example: Roval SLX 24 or the CLX 32. Same for others. COVID effect? or just supply and demand?

The "Covid effect" is supply and demand.

Found both the wheel sets you listed on the internet so unless I couldn't find them anywhere at all. Also worth contacting your bike shop or favorite supplier to find out when they next have stock.

Yeah, I get that, but I guess COID has exacerbated that effect since lots of stuff is unavailable. Oh, well.

Link? I found vendors, but most out of the US.

Not too surprising since it's been hard to buy rims for the last year.

Ahh another thread not understanding the delays and issues caused by COVID-19. Yes delays will be around for a long time until COVID is solved worldwide and things have time to go back to whatever the new normal is until then expect massive delays in stuff.

If you really want to reduce it to one factor, you aren't wrong.

Not to derail this topic, but COVID won't be solved when so many people, for God knows what reason, are refusing to get vaccinated.

<rant mode off>

Anyway, I've signed up for updated from Roval, and other sites for stock changes. In the meantime, I'll keep riding with what I have.

You kind of did. I was going to add something about no incentive, but I wont.

Maybe they are on that freighter the Saudi's seized for blocking the canal so long.

But yes, we still haven't fully recovered from the supply chain issues COVID created. And maybe some factories were re-tooled to make other more profitable stuff for other markets due to COVID.

I have been running into delays with a lot of bicycle parts. I tried to buy a 120 mm fat bike crankset back in December. The LBS had some Race Face parts on hand, but not a full crankset, and they were not able to get the missing pieces from any of their suppliers. I couldn't find them anywhere either. So the LBS was out, unless I wanted a $500 carbon crank. I am good to go with carbon road cranks (I have 4), but my off road style is probably not compatible with carbon cranks.

Chain Reaction Cycles to the rescue! They had a Hope alloy crankset for about half of what a carbon crankset was going to cost. Paid the bill and had it in a week.

As winter transitioned into spring, and the ice got wetter and slicker, I broke one of the Formula brake master cylinders on the Fat Bike. Replacement parts were unavailable. Found a Hope brake set on eBay, so I bought it. Then, the seller messaged me that it would be 10 weeks before they shipped because Hope is running limited production. Canceled the order.

I found another web store in Germany that listed them. Bought a set and they stated that they would ship in 3 days. Six days later and no shipping notice. When I contacted them they said that they will ship in 8 weeks because Hope is running limited production. Canceled the order.

Checked Chain Reaction. Very limited stock, but they had Hope V4 brakes instead of E4. And they are bright red. So what. Maybe more brakes than I wanted, but the bike will be available for spring riding. They should be here in 3-4 days.

So a few thoughts on this:

• The marketing forecasters for the bicycle industry never saw this coming. Bike instead of gym and bike instead of subway. Instead they saw decreased demand.
• With the forecast for decreased demand the component manufacturers cut back on production.
• With decreased demand, raw material suppliers cut back on their production schedules. So Hope can't get as much aluminum.
• For bottom feeders like myself, a lot of the bike parts we can buy are the leftovers from bicycle manufacturing. Suddenly, with the increased demand there are no leftovers. So that part of the bottom feeder's supply chain is gone.
• Weird things do happen. The loss of shipping containers has been high this year (https://www.freightwaves.com/news/oc...%20and%202019.) and that ship going sideways in the Suez and Egypt holding it until they get paid, and probably a lot of other crap that I don't know about. But when you rely on a supply chain that is rooted in Asia, both North America and Europe are vulnerable to interruptions.

So, shop around. Maybe see if you can buy an "ethically sourced" used part. Some of the vendors who don't do a lot of OEM supply may have inventory. Your LBS may have something that will work on the shelf, looking for a good home. Beware of vendors who sell a promise to deliver in the future. They have no clue when or if they will actually be able to deliver on their promises.

Global shipping is messed up in general right now, and was a problem before the Suez Canal mess. The bike industry in particular has been hit hard by rising demand.
For the same reasons you won't find a ton of bikes on showroom floors right now, you also may have delays in getting wheels and other parts.

In my shop we've had trouble getting our hands on a variety of bike parts and bikes themselves. This is all due to the pandemic because manufacturing companies cant make things in the quantities they used to. We've had luck finding things on Amazon or Ebay that we normally have the customer purchase themselves and bring in.

As it was explained to me by my LBS, there was (and probably still is) a backlog on shipping. Most of the stuff is sitting in the shipyards waiting to be put on a boat. Manufacturers can't make anymore because they have nowhere to put it until it can be shipped. COVID restrictions keep the boats from exporting. And domestically (at least in the US), all the postal carriers are underfunded and overworked.

And that's not including weather and other unforeseen hiccups (ie stuck boats)

Agreed there are enough stupid people out there but eventually this will have to end it just might take a long time.

Man.... sure hope wheels don't take the same path of scarcity that ammo is taking...

Not important. I have enough ammo. I need wheels. Mind you, I'm not desperate enough to do something crazy, like buy Mavic, but I'll keep looking.

buy direct from the various Chinese makes!!! They are good wheels, and for 1/2 the price. They're delivered within 2-4 weeks.
I will never buy brand names again unless we're talking at least 50% discount (which does not happen)

Check November Bicycle for wheels looks like they have some in stock.

Uh....no. I've had far too many negative experiences with various Chinese products and try to avoid them when possible.

I checked, but nothing by Roval.

Why are you set on Roval only?

They are not all bad. I've built many hundreds of wheels with this company's rims, but they also sell complete wheel sets at very reasonable prices. There have been zero issues with the rims.
https://carbonal.net/collections/rim...lincher-wheels

I think that if you aren't super picky you can get something that meets your needs, maybe for more money than you wanted to spend and not exactly the brand/model that you wanted. Otherwise, be prepared to wait until 2023.