Rolf Wheels
 

Does anyone know if Rolf Wheels went out of business? Their website, Rolfwheels.com, won't come up. I did a search and that's the address that comes up for them.

http://www.freewheel.com/rolf/

http://www.chainreaction.com/rolf.htm

Glad I could help, DG:D

I sent an email to mr Rolf Dietrich and referred him to this thread.

That said, Trek no longer uses Rolf wheels on any of there bikes, im sure that 75%+ of all rolf wheels sold were OEM on the Trek, Klein, LeMond, and Fisher bikes. IIRC USPS used rolf wheels, but soon changed due to problems with the vector pro rims.

I have '99 Vector Pro's on my Klein Quantum Race, and love them. There stiff, fast, and light. I hope i dont have any problems down the road...

Thanks Klein, I found those pages earlier too. But I just wondered why the Rolfwheels.com address no longer worked. Or did it ever?:confused:

Joe, the bike I'm looking at has Rolf Vector Pro's on it too. They look awesome but now I'm worried. What kind of problems did they have?

I dont know....I've never been to it if it did work:D

I think the problem was limited to Vector Pros produced in 1998, a "seam" issue where the rim would split in two. Do you remember when the USPS team started with the Vector Pros, but quickly changed them to a different wheelset? That was the first time i heard about the issue. I think they fixed this problem, and shouldnt be a factor with the newer wheels.

DG, check out this page: http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://rolfwheels.com

Interesting! Sometime between November of 2000 and March 2001, Rolf changed there site from a content site with info on the wheels, to a "Contact Trek for warranty!" website.

Hmmmm... The Wayback Machine huh? Gee thanks Mr. Peabody!:D
Are you old enough to remember that cartoon Joe?:)

Rolf is still in business, but I think Trek actuallowns the Rolfwheels.com domain name -- so there's the problem. I know a lot of people who swear by their Rolf Vector Pros, though.

Me? I don't like them for a 'cross bike, though I do know of people who ride them on 'cross. I just don't like low-spoke-count wheels, I guess. My preference would be for a set of wheels built up from Mavic Open Pros or MA3s for 'cross. In case you're wondering, you could have a pair of Open Pros built up with Ultegra hubs for about $300, MA3s for $250.

I just recived an email from Rolf himself:

Thanks for the referral.

Trek lost the rights to manufacture and sell ROLF Wheels at the end of last year.

I am going forward with newly designed wheels in the aftermarket segment and have new models that replace the Vector Pro, Sestriere and Carbon models.

The Vector Pro replacement is called the VIGOR and its rim is more aerodynamic with a 34 mm section depth ( over the original 30MM ) and a much narrower spoke bed. It went from 1680 grams for the Pro to 1430 grams for the VIGOR.

The Sestriere went from 1490 grams to 1265 grams for its replacement, the ELAN. The ELAN has also become aerodynamically cleaner with recessed nipples and an cleaner rim with a section depth of 19 MM compared to the original 23MM .

In both cases, for the VIGOR and the ELAN, the spoke type and count remains the same. The Elan is now hand build as the VIGOR remains a hand build wheel.

The brand name has been augmented to ROLFPRIMA to distinguish it from the Trek build wheels and the marketing strategy is DEALER-DIRECT.

Consumers must ask their bike shops to order the wheels from me.

Thank you!
Rolf

Wow. Ask and you shall receive! Thanks Joe!:)

I'm old enough to remember but the memory is hard to remember...................... :D

Went through the same things several months ago when I was researching wheels. Of course I wasn't smart enough to just ask Joe...

I've actually met and rode with Rolf the man himself. Very nice man and a real engineer and lover of cycling from what I can tell. I saw some of the new wheels he's working on for this year when I was at a big ride in Indiana last Fall. Incredible engineering, very stealthy looking, super light, strong and expensive (of course). I'd keep a lookout for the new stuff and check it out.