I used to be a fan of eyelets. Then I swapped my mountain bike from Mavic 319s to Stans Flow EX (to convert my MTB to tubeless for flat prevention). The Flow EX are 80 grams lighter and much more lateral stiffness.

After looking at everything the reason became clear. Old designs like Mavic 319/719/Open Pros/Open Sports have tall clincher beads and constant wall thickness. Modern tubeless ready rims have shorter beads variable wall thickness. The saved material is moved to the spoke track. With a thicker spoke track there's no need for eyelets. Combine that with variable wall thickness, properly designed thanks to CAD, stronger and lighter is possible for no additional cost.

In the two year interval I've sold off all my 319 wheels and switched everything to modern tubeless ready rims. Stans Flow EX on my MTB, SunRingle HelixTR25/27 on my GG/Tourer and DT R460 on my city bike. My road bike is running a Shimano tubeless wheelset.

Even if you don't want to run tubeless (today) TR rims are a better solution, they run tubes just fine and going forward you'll be able to take advantage of tubeless technology as it takes over the market.

I'm a fan of the Ryde Andra 30 rims for bikes that will be abused. Also Velocity NoBS are a solid option too. I've overloaded a LHT like crazy and did not have any issues, the wheels ended up getting replaced because the rim sidewall split due to rim brake wear

ESquared, how many miles on those wheels? Curious if rim wear contributed to failure. For such big loads on a rim brake wheel I'd be inclined to go for the Ryde Andra rim if replacing rims occurs more than you like. The Rhynolites are a great value, after that I'd try VeloOrange Escapade or Velocity Atlas.

We're a 500+lbs tandem team; 40H Dyads worked fine for several thousand miles; then a spoke failure (straight 2.0mm spokes) in the front (captain is much heavier than the stoker). Changed to 48H, and went with Velocity NoBS (same price at Niagara) with Wheelsmith DB14 spokes.

The Dyad front rim was rebuilt with Wheelsmith DB15 spokes, and along the rear wheel is on a mid '90s Trek 720 based commuter.

Hubs are Wheelmaster "tandem" hubs; 135mm rear OLD.

This is a good option.

Are you using brass nipples? I ask because my daughter hit "something" on her CX bike and the brass nipples on three or four of the spokes deformed and pulled through the rim preventing rim damage.

If you have trouble again, try some DT Alpine III spokes. I'm going to use them for my next wheel build because they'll fill the spoke hole in the hub better and provide more support area at that point. The 1.8 section will also provide a little bit of stretch under tension.

Brad

PS A trailer, as mentioned earlier, may very well be a good option even with the 60-70 lb. load

Yes, mine have the Alex Aventurer rims as well. They are doing fine. I even had damage from hitting a chunk on concrete at about 35mph on a downhill that required pounding out, and surprisingly the rim was still true afterwards. I'm still riding on that rim every day.

That looks like over-tensioned spokes to me and I'd be interested in who made them.

Edit: I see now that these were the original factory-made wheels so have to agree with the poster up-thread who made the point that these should always be evened up in tension and then thoroughly stressed/de-stressed.

Asymmetrical damage like that is actually a good sign of under-tensioned wheel flex / dynamic failure. The margin of error between static failure and wheel flex failure is smaller the larger the axle load is though.

A few thousand, mostly dry weather. No significant wear.

Damn... I would definitely consider replacing that rim unless it's a steel rim. Solid brass vs an aluminium hole... There's no way that rim is unharmed.

ES, Amazingly the rim showed no galling or cracks and the affected nipples' shoulder simply deformed upwards to the same diameter of the spoke hole. In between pregnancies, she's put quite a few miles on the bike since I repaired the wheel.

Brad