Yossarian22

I'm building up an Urbanskey disc frame and will of course need a wheelset. The bike will see pavement 90+% of the time, but will probably see some time on a gravel loop or fire road. I hope to be able to swing White T-11 hubs but may consider Bitex for cost reasons.

Though I will use a traditional tube setup at first (have a decent set of 25mm road tires on hand) I will eventually go tubeless. Looking for some feedback on the following rims:
H+Son Hydra
Pacenti Forza
Stan's Grail
Velocity Airleron

The list above isn't intended to be exclusive, it's just what's been recommended to me so far.

JohnJ80

I'd add to that the HED Belgium Plus. Awesome rims and I have them on several wheel sets. Easy to get a wheel set in the ~1400g range. That would be my choice.

https://www.hedcycling.com/belgium-p...rake-clincher/

J.

Carbonfiberboy 

I'd add Kinlin XC279 from bikehubstore.com. I've been using these rims for years on our tandem and my singles. Great rims, many spoke count options.

Yossarian22

Thanks for the comments. I should have clarified that I will be having the wheelset built, and am not doing that part myself.

None of the wheelbuilders I contacted use the Kinlin's. I think that November in RI does however, and will get in touch with them. As far HED, the Belgium+ rims are certainly attractive and get good reviews however, they are more expensive than the alternatives. Have looked without success for a convincing argument to justify the cost premium. With respect to the others, here's what I've gleaned from the net so far:

* Hydra - good specs but reports of tubeless tires "blown off" the rims (though this appears to strictly anecdotal). Full disclosure: My road bike has Archetype rims and I have been favorably impressed (two years and over 5k of trouble-free riding) and so am inclined to stick with H+Son.

* Forza - recommended by a number of wheel builders I've contracted who like the asymmetrical spoke pattern Pacenti uses. Quite a number of reports of cracking, though this seems to be wrt the predecessor SL23's rather than the Forza.

* Grail - This was the initial front-runner and seems generally well-regarded. Supposed to be difficult to fit tubeless tires to, but in my view, this may be a plus rather than a negative if it means a tighter seal. Stan's seem to elicit a fair amount of internet hate but it's not clear to me why this is. I've also read that they are made in the same factory that Pacenti use but have not been able to validate that.

* Airleron - Mostly well-regarded but with the caveat that Velocity QC is often a bit lax, often necessitating a fair amount of touch-up by the wheel builder. The only rim of the four using sleeved, rather than welded joining - something that I've always associated with less expensive rims, though I admit this is not a fact-based belief.

Seattle Forrest

I agree it's (mostly) a positive for tires to be hard to fit, it means you're not going to burp your air away when you corner aggressively.

I had a set of Stan's Grail rims, they came with a cheap bike, and the wheels fell apart. That was the fault of the spokes, but doesn't really leave a great impression. Maybe that's what's responsible for some of the internet hate you see for them.

SethAZ 

You might consider some carbon rims from Light-Bicycle. The 28mm wide by 46mm deep rims are $188 each plus shipping, around $425 or so delivered to your door. They're a little more expensive than the rims you are talking about, but not that much really, and they're pretty nice.

I had no problems with the Stans Grail wheelset that came on my Lynskey. They had around 600 miles or so on them when I replaced them with the wheels I build up on the Light-Bicycle rims. My Grails had 32 spokes front and back, and they were nice and straight, ran very well, felt good, etc. I had no complaints about them at all. Not sure what the hate is all about.

Ben I.

I'd also add these to the list. Used them for my gravel bike wheelset build and they've been fantastic. I've been running them tubeless for a year now with no issues, although I had Clement MSO's on them.

I was also looking at the Hydra's but they're hard to find sometimes so I went with the HEDs. I think any of those choices would work out well for you though so can't really go wrong.

Carbonfiberboy 

You don't really need the builder to add a markup for you. You simply furnish the rims, they build. If you know your hub and the spoke pattern you want, BHS will calculate spoke lengths for you and furnish the spokes, too. With the local builder I've used, I furnished hub, rim, spokes, he built. This works with whatever rim etc. you want to use, unless you think the builder will pass on a discount from the manufacturer rather than mark up the part.

Which raises another issue. Some people just tell the builder how they'll use the wheelset and let the builder decide what to build and how to build it. My approach has been to decide what parts I want in the wheelset and how I want it built, then let the builder do the work.

And then when I get the set, I get out my trusty TM-1 tensiometer and check the spoke tensions for value and consistency.

ThermionicScott 

I was going to say -- can you point to any reports of a Forza itself cracking? There were quite a few lessons learned from the SL23.