Light Bicycle wheel rims?

[UrgentDelay]

Btw: It would be such a big help for everyone if there would be a separate thread with a table, including the meassured width of tires (WAM), tire sizes and the rim sizes (with lip design hooked or hookless). Just like the Light Bicycle one, but filled with all the posted information from here.

I did just that, feel free to contribute: viewtopic.php?f=132&t=174930

[UrgentDelay]

Ordered Light-Bicycle WR50 flyweight with carbon spokes.
Estimated to be around 1320g.

Originally considered CRW 5060 @1290g. But turn that down because
1) Staggered width. CRW is only wide in the front (25 int, 32 ext) but significantly narrower (21 int, 28 ext) in the rear.
2) it cost close to 50% more. While weighting only about 30g less and isn't as wide in the rear.

Let see how 21 carbon spokes and flyweight rim ride, compare to my 24 spokes Cx-ray+Cx-sprint and standard weight rim WR65.
Update will come when I receive the wheels and ride it for a few weeks.

Any impressions yet?

[LouisN]

Interested in knowing if any WW member has ridden LB "Flyweight" rims, and can comment on durability ?
Louis

[stalkersk]

I have WR65 flyweight for 2.5year, they have around 25k km, other then my Bitex hub being warrantied due to bearing seat failure, zero issues.

[Mr.Gib]

Interested in knowing if any WW member has ridden LB "Flyweight" rims, and can comment on durability ?
Louis

WR50 Flyweight and I weigh 77kg. Still have a bit of power in the legs, ride the odd hammerfest with young guys way out of my league, push the bike pretty hard in the corners, lots of stomping up short steep hills. But we don't have broken roads, so no pothole strikes, and a beat up body means I am always careful to absorb any bumps. These wheels see about a third of my annual kms, so aprox 8000 - 10,000km per year, now in second season of action.

IMO the only additional vulnerabilities compared to the heavier standard version would be a side imact or a serious pothole strike. Never heard of a spoke pulling through, or a rim cracking at the spoke hole which is something you might expect from and underbuilt rim. In terms of actual riding performance, the rims themselves don't seem to flex, so I assume same performance as the standard version. Two thumbs up from me.

[alanyu]

I have flyweight AR46 and normal AR56, both rim brake. To my huge surprise, the flyweight offers more braking power.

[pdlpsher1]

Can carbon spokes be paired with DT Swiss hubs or are they only available with LB's own branded hubs?

I have a pair of LB flyweight wheels and zero problems whatsoever. I'll only go with flyweight rims in the future.

[Hexsense]

There are two types of carbon spokes.
The narrow one fit any hub. This one seems to have reliability issue.
The broad one that only fit special hub. This one is stiff and strong (thus 21 spokes is more than enough).

I don't recommend narrow carbon spokes that fit into normal hub.

[pdlpsher1]

Got it. Thanks. I only trust DT Swiss hubs so I must go with CX-Ray then.

[garbageman]

Interested in knowing if any WW member has ridden LB "Flyweight" rims, and can comment on durability ?
Louis

I managed to crack a flyweight AR45. Hit a small but sharp rock in a corner with the bike leaned over at ~50kph. Had a 25c tire fitted (~26.7mm WAM iirc) at the time which left the edge of the rim exposed. A 28 may have protected the rim from the impact. <60kg rider. Up to that point, it survived maybe 15k km of riding and racing through frequently potholed, rough/broken surfaces including high-speed descents; lots of (ocassionally poorly-timed) bunnyhops over cracks and potholes, up and down curbs and speedbumps, and sometimes just for fun when the opportunity to get slightly airborne presented itself; a few forays into category 1/2 gravel; and a crash which broke a spoke and scratched up the surface a bit. So, I'd say pretty durable but not quite bombproof. I didn't hesistate to order another flyweight rim to replace it.

[wheelbuilder]

Interested in knowing if any WW member has ridden LB "Flyweight" rims, and can comment on durability ?
Louis

I use a flyweight falcon pro ar375 as a front rim and standard as rear. At 83kg I was worried I may be skirting the limit, but it has been faultless. Great layup and finishing throughout. Would use it as a rear without question.

[alexsmac]

A word of warning on LB carbon spokes based on what happened to my LB wheelset last night. The attached photo is of the rear wheel on an AR465 wheelset I purchased from LB in June of last year (AR465 rims, Carbon Ti X-Hubs and LB carbon-titanium spokes).

The bike was static in a display stand (and had been for over a week), the frame is suspended off the ground, so the wheels were only supporting their own weight. Multiple very loud explosive bangs later this was the result. The titanium threaded inserts _were_ glued into holes in the carbon blades, emphasis on *were* as 3 are now very much *not* glued in. The carbon blade of the spokes appears (visually) to be unscathed, although obviously I wouldn't try to reuse them, but they are completely free of the titanium inserts. Neither this bike nor these wheels have ever been used in a trainer, nor have they been ridden off-road (insofar as UK 'roads' constitute tarmac).

If this had happend whilst riding, I think the effects would have been both immediate and catastrophic.

I reached out to LB last night, and so far their response has been that they're sorry, and they're offering to refund the cost of the spokes and their $30 wheel building fee (only). They have not asked for the wheels or spokes to be returned so they can analyse them to see how and why they failed, read into that what you will, nor have they agreed to pay for having the wheels either inspected and rebuilt in the UK (I estimated £250), or sent back to LB to be rebuilt.

It's a shame, as prior to this incident the wheels were great. After this incident, and given their response, I would advise against using them. They sold a wheelset that was fundamentally unsafe, either due to defective LB spokes, a bad build, or both and they're not prepared to pay the full cost of returning the wheelset to a safe and usable state. Nor do they seem interested in getting to the bottom of exactly how it happened. Perhaps they don't care, or perhaps they already know this is a failure mode, I think it's debatable which of those is worse. Either way, for me personally that's not a debate I'm interested in playing through my mind whilst riding.

[toxin]

another casualty of insisting on carbon spokes in a non-carbon spoke hub

[wheelbuilder]

another casualty of insisting on carbon spokes in a non-carbon spoke hub

Agreed. Sorry this happened to the owner though.

[alexsmac]

I'm curious why you think the hub is at fault here, as its the rim end of the spokes that has failed. LB explicitly offer this hub combination with their carbon spokes, and nothing I can find in Carbon Ti's own wheel building documentation for this hub precludes using carbon spokes. Carbon Ti do have constraints on the spoke tension and lacing pattern, both of which LB followed (the latter for sure as it's evident visually, the former according to their build report). If you have references that contradict that I would be interested to see them, so please share.