Wheel No. 00033 - a DT Swiss / Shutter Precision collaboration Dynamo Hub!

Late in 2024, DT Swiss came out with a dynamo hub based upon Shutter Precision's dynamo technology coupled with DT Swiss hub design/tech.  What a great development, I thought when I learned of it ... some months later. I love my DT Swiss hubs, and I love my SP dynamo lighting setup. DT Swiss sells these as complete wheels or hub-only for amateur builders such as myself, as well as for pros. 

I purchased one of the disk hubs from a German online retailer for 132 Euro.  It cost less than the similar SP PL-7. And it gets great reviews.  Plus it looks as if it should be easier to service than the original SP design. Very nice.

It took awhile to get around to building the wheel, but I finally built up a front gravel bike wheel with the hub in October, and fine-tuned and used the hub in November while up at Yatsugatake.

What can I say? The hub was very easy to build up. It takes straight pull spokes, which I have not used much for wheelbuilding (but will try to use in the future when possible, given how easy it was to thread them and how common they have become over the past 10-15 years). I paired the hub with Sapim CX Ray spokes -- my "go-to" -- and a no-brand-equity ("OTVTO Official Store") rim from AliExpress that is 45mm deep, measures as 28mm internal and 36+mm external, and looks perfect.

The hub works like a charm! And it is an efficient setup, with the extra drag negligible when the light is off (under 1 watt even at high speed) and barely noticeable (up to ~6 watts) with the light on.

Since I built it up on a very wide gravel-ready rim, it will go on the RAMAX, which already has a Busch Mueller IQ-XS light. So I should be ready for adventures both off- and on-road in 2026!

Over time, I seem to find that my hubs are gravitating toward DT Swiss ... while my hub dynamos are all via SP, so this is a perfect "love child". Come to think of it, my "go to" light is now the Busch Mueller IQ-XS, which is on several of my bikes. And 3 of my 4 non-recumbent bikes that are fully rideable these days ...  are via Tim Smith at GS Astuto (the Ti Travel Bike, the RAMAX, and the Mugikusa Pass ICAN FL-1 frame climbing bike).  Maybe I am converging on the best products over time? Or at least I am converging on the products that best fit my riding style(s) and budget.

Next on my list -- a set of 650B wheels with large gravel tires for the RAMAX.  I tried some Panaracer Gravel King 1X-R 700x40mm tires and I felt the bike handled differently and was not nearly as "right" with the resulting larger wheel circumference. The tires themselves are excellent, but the geometry felt off and was not easy to adjust to.  Maybe 650B wheels would solve that.  Ideally I will try out a set somewhere before going to the trouble to build a set, but they should work well, though I am not sure if they will allow me to go larger than a 40mm width.

Wheel Nos 00030, 00031, and 00032

In the PBP year, new dynamo hub wheels are in order. 

Jerome asked for a new one, together with a new light. So back in June I built him one using a slightly worn H Plus Son rim I had used briefly while waiting for a different (tubeless ready) rim some time back. Jerome says he is done trying tubeless so this was a perfect match. A new SV-8 hub, and DT Swiss aero-bladed spokes, and voila -- Wheel No. 00030:

For myself, I want to try to ride PBP with a more "modern" tubeless setup this year, with carbon rim wheels. I got a slightly shallower Imezi rim than my existing ones (complete with pink decals to match my rear wheel) and built it up with Sapim CX-Ray spokes and another SV-8 dynamo hub, for use with my travel bike. Wheel No. 00031:

After a few weeks of riding the new setup, I worried about carbon rim brakes for PBP. Jerome and I went for a ride to the base of Wada Pass ... and I could not help but remember the time I melted another carbon rim sitting on the brakes descending the pass. And even though the dry weather stopping distance seemed okay, I lack the stopping confidence that I have with regular aluminum clinchers or, better yet, disk brakes. 

I saw that Ijichi-san, one of the regular Tokyo area randonneurs, had just taken delivery of a beautiful new custom titanium rando bike from Vlad at Equilibrium cycles, Tokyo-based Latvian framebuilder, and that Ijichi-san's new steed was using mechanical disk brakes. The thought hit me immediately -- why not swap out my Reynolds Ouzo Pro fork and replace it with a road disk brake fork, including mechanical disk brake that I could use with my current SRAM AXS Force/rim brake brifters? After all, that was the setup that I ended up with on the Yamabushi, where I did not really like the original brakes -- and a front mechanical disk was the ideal solution. After some searching, I decided to go for a made-in-USA Paul Components flat-mount short-pull mechanical disk brake that looks and feels very solid and has strong reviews. 

So I built up Wheel No. 32 today from an SP Dynamo PL-7 hub, Sapim CX Ray spokes, and a fairly wide (22.5mm internal, 28mm external, 40-42.5mm deep "wavy", hookless) rim purchased off Ali Express. Likewise I got a road disk brake fork from Ali Express. Everything has worked fine (so far) except that the fork is designed for M6 bolts, while the Paul and every other disk brake I have ever seen uses M5. Anyway, with a bit of extra elbow grease the new M6 bolts I purchased fit and the brake is attached.

Wheel No. 00032:

The mechanical disk brake:

The wide rim means the Corsa N.EXT TLR 700x28 tire sizes to 29mm wide, but still plenty of room in this fork. I think this should just about be the perfect rim/tire combination for both comfort and speed.

  

New Wheels Day - Joining the All-Road Bike Revolution

The RAMAX has proven a fast and comfortable bike for long day rides. So far, the longest trip has been the 300km Beef Line/Green Furusato Line brevet in Ibaraki.  I have not yet ridden it on 400km or longer rides because of the lack of a front wheel with dynamo hub that fits with the 12mm thru axle and disk brake specification.  For a 400km or longer ride, I don't want to worry about battery life for my front light. Problem now solved!

On Friday, a beautiful new set of handmade GS Astuto EV36+ wheels arrived. 

The carbon rims are WIDE, 32mm outer width, and 36mm deep. For comparison, my typical Velocity A23 or H Plus Sons Archetype rim, which once were considered "wide" rims, similar to the early HED Belgium rims, have a 23mm outer width. The GS Astuto EV36+ are more like the Miche Graff Route wheels ridden by the winner of last week's Gravel Unbound, Ivar Slik. as he went 200 miles (322 kms) on a variety of surfaces at an average speed of 34.4 kph. They are a similar hookless carbon rim, 36mm deep, 30-32mm outside width. Even the current Zipp 303 Firecrest tubeless rim, which has a definite "road" racing heritage, now has a 30mm outer width.

Since the EV36+ rims are carbon, hookless and disk-brake specific, they can be both very light and strong. Indeed, the box they arrived in felt ... as if it were empty!

Hookless rims are lighter weight and easier to manufacture than hooked ones. They should only be used with a compatible tubeless setup and at lower pressures than a typical road bike. Given the width, of course, they must always be used with larger width tires that are designed for lower pressure. (The tires should be 30mm wide or greater to fit the EV36+ rims.) Hookless rims will help drive the high end of the cycling market toward the conclusions Jan Heine of Bicycle Quarterly/Rene Herse has been preaching the past decade in numerous Bicycle Quarterly articles and his book, The All-Road Bike Revolution: wide supple tires run at lower pressures are as fast or faster, and a lot more comfortable, than narrower tires run at higher pressures.

The RAMAX finally as it was intended--An all-road adventure bicycle.

Both front and rear wheels have 24 Sapim CX-Ray spokes. CX Rays are the best spokes by far, in my experience.  They combine strength, light weight, and aerodynamics. Unbeatable. Not cheap, but worth every penny. I used to break spokes regularly. When I switched to building (and in this case, having built for me wheels with CX Rays ... the problem pretty much went away. For an aluminum clincher rim, I would hesitate to use a 24-spoke rear wheel, even with CX-Rays, but for these wide, deep and stiff rims, with fatter tires running a lower pressure, a 24-spoke setup should be fine even for challenging, off-road conditions.

The rear hub is an OEM/private label model made for GS Astuto, and the front is an SP Dynamo PL-7. The hubs are for Centerlock disk brake rotors -- Tim Smith tells me that the Centerlock design, a Shimano standard, is better, and I now agree. It is a lot easier to put the Centerlock rotors on (and take them off) and to get them in exactly the right position than with the 6-bolt style I am accustomed to using. And indeed, the weight of the dynamo hub for Centerlock is 10g lower than the corresponding 6-bolt style from SP Dynamo.

The PL-7 is SP Dynamo's newest model, released just before the pandemic. It is about the same weight as the SV-8 models I have used in the past, but offers more power output at the same speed. It is noticeably lighter than SP Dynamo's previous disk-brake specific versions, but it looks and feels just as solid. The hub is designed for the now-common 12mm thru axle specification, which offers the possibility of a stronger axle than a 9mm QR. (Some hubs can be converted between QR and 12mm thru axle by changing the end caps, but most older hubs cannot).

For tires, one of Tim's suggestions was the IRC Boken Plus 700x32mm version. It is a gravel bike tire with a slick middle strip so that it can go fast on tarmac as well as handling rough or muddy surfaces. IRC is a Japanese brand that is not as widely known as some European tires (Conti, Vittoria, Michelin, et al), but IRC was one of the early adopters of road tubeless technology. IRC stands for Inoue Rubber Corporation -- headquartered in Nagoya and with production facilities in Sendai as well as in SE Asia). The Boken Plus has gotten some good reviews so I was happy to try them.  They feel as if the side walls are relatively supple -- crucial to making a tire fast. And IRC has a lot of experience with tubeless -- these hold air extremely well and, Tim reports, set up very easily.

Matched with the wide EV36+ rim, the tires actually measure at 35.5mm width -- and seem to have a large air volume similar to the 700x36 Challenge Gravel Grinder tires that were on the loaner wheels when I first got the RAMAX.  So while, for gravel tires, they are near the "narrow" end of the spectrum, for me they are huge. I inflated them to 55psi or 3.8 bars of pressure. I will try 45-50psi or even lower for rough surfaced roads. But years of riding at higher pressure has gotten me stuck in my ways, and it will take awhile to change the prejudice that a tire needs to be "hard" to the feel to be fast. 

I took my first long ride with the new wheels on Saturday -- 200 kms entirely on tarmac. The ride feel was comfortable and smooth as silk. My overall moving speed for the day, 23.5 kph, was about what I would have expected for a 200km ride with ~1500m of elevation gain, a long gradual uphill grind and much less downhill, in humid weather.  If I struggled at times, it had more to do with the humidity and that farewell party for a friend that I attended the night before than it did the wheels. Indeed, the wheelset is so light that even with the heavier gravel tires they do not feel heavy or sluggish -- a feeling that has turned me off of gravel tires in the past. Even with the gravel wheels, the bike still climbs well, and it descends like a dream on tarmac. What once might have been a kind of "white knuckle" descent at high speed at the end of the ride, was very relaxed though my top speed seemed no different.

I look forward to many years of riding with this wheelset.  Tim is already suggesting that I might want to try them with a pair of super supple, lighter Rene Herse tires at some point ...but for the time being the Boken Plus will do just fine.

Wheel No. 00029

I finally built up a replacement wheel for my Dura Ace rear hub (FH-9000). A new version of the same go-to H Plus Sons Archetype 32 hole rim, and Sapim CX-Ray spokes.  Why fix it if it ain't broke? The last time I replaced the rim, in 2019, I reused the spokes, so this time the makeover was primarily aimed at isntalling a new set of spokes, and the rim probably could have lasted awhile longer. I will replace the bearings in the hub as well, to make it a new wheel except for some of the longer lasting hub components.

A rim design that remains attractive, in my humble opinion.

Very modest wear on the Ti freehub body. More durable than most.

Proper wheelbuilding - rim spoke hole located directly over the hub label.

Wheel No. 28 Redux

I had built up Wheel No. 28 in December of last year but have not used it yet. My 10-year old Ti Travel bike frame needed a repair to the seat tube due to a boneheaded move (I overtightened the front derailleur clamp). It is repaired, but I am waiting for it to get shipped back from the factory (in another larger shipment of frames). Welcome to the supply chain issues of 2022!

Meanwhile, I was able to secure a DT Swiss RR411 32-hole front rim that would match the RR411 rim I used for the rear Wheel No. 27.  The rear one is asymmetric, to allow slightly more even tension between drive and non-drive side. The front rim is symmetric. I decided to take the new spokes and rim off Wheel No. 28's H Plus Son Archetype rim and rebuild it with the DT Swiss rim instead. Why? Of course, the aesthetics favor a matching front and rear rim. More important, RR411 rims are "tubeless ready" while H Plus Son rims are not, and it makes sense that both front and rear rims have this designation, as I will eventually try them with a tubeless set up. Finally, at around 930 grams w/o QR skewers or rim tape, this is around 25 grams lighter than my previous lightest dynamo hub front wheel, with a 370 gram hub and 32 triple cross (Sapim CX-Ray bladed) spokes. The RR411 is probably not as strong as the H Plus Sons Archetype rim, but I expect it will hold up just fine.

Wheel No. 00028 -- First new SP dynamo hub in years!

This is around a 955g wheel, including the dynamo hub. About as light weight as imaginable for a 32-spoke, wide-rimmed, very sturdy wheel with a dynamo. 

As part of preparing the Ti Travel Bike, Voyage Voyage, for its second decade, I thought I also should replace my front wheel, built in December of 2014. The wheel and its Shutter Precision SV-9 dynamo hub has gone at least 20,000 kilometers over the past 7 years. The hub is a closed system -- can only be opened and maintained at the factory, in theory at least. So while it still "rolls good",  the bearings must have worn a bit by now. I recently noticed a very slight degree of "play" in it, so I think it may be nearing time to replace. And the wheel's H Plus Son Archetype rim is showing definite wear on the brake track -- what started as a straight brake track is now noticeably sunken/concave on both sides. I think the rim could last another year or two, but if I am going to replace the hub I might as well do the rim at the same time. If I build a new wheel, it should be what I use with the Ti Travel bike for PBP 2023 and beyond.

The new dynamo hub arrived it seemed almost overnight, actually second day I think after it shipped -- Taiwan is incredibly close to Japan and so it is practically like a domestic shipment! The SV-9 is designed to meet the German regulator's standards of output for a 20 or 24 inch wheel. On a 700c road wheel (28 inch) this hub requires a slightly higher speed than the regulatory standard to achieve the necessary output. This also is true for the SV-8/SD-8. The PV-8/PD-8 and PD-7/PL-7 are the models that clear the German regulator's output requirements. But that regulatory standard is for commuters on heavy bikes going slowly in urban environments. And it is for older lighting that drains more power than the newest, most efficient LED lights and reflector systems. The regulatory requirement is just not an issue for someone riding a road bike, even a plodding randonneur in the middle of the night.  And the SV-9 hub is just over 300 grams -- the lightest dynamo hub that works. The SV-9 (and SV-8, to some extent) have lower drag than other options. (These models are not included in any of the head-to-head tests by SON-friendly reviewers like Jan Heine at Bicycle Quarterly, or this Australian touring cyclist. Instead, they test the PV-8/PD-8. In my experience, anyone doing Audax or light, bikepacking touring will be very happy with the SV-8 or SV-9. They easily power a 50, 70 or 100 Lux LED headlight plus a rear light. And the drag is not noticeable. 

The H Plus Son Archetype is always an easy wheel to build, and today was no exception. And the H Plus Son Archetype remains, in my view, one of the best looking aluminum clincher rims out there. Just some good wheel-building therapy!

Wheel No. 00027

Wheel No. 00027

After a flurry of wheel building during 2012-2015, I have rebuilt a number of wheels in recent years ... but until today it has been quite awhile since I built up any entirely new ones. 

In 2020/21, I rebuilt each of my Imezi wheels after damaging the rims (my fault). 

In Spring 2019, after the rim died in Tasmania but before Paris-Brest-Paris and the other cycling planned for a European trip, I rebuilt Wheel No. 00024 with a new rim, but reused the lovely Dura Ace 9000 hub and the still okay Sapim CX-Ray spokes.* 

My plan is to convert the Ti Travel bike to SRAM Force AXS eTap 12-speed groupset -- for the next decade of use. That requires a rear wheel with a SRAM XDR hub. I got an XDR conversion freehub adapter for my Imezi 167 carbon chincher wheels, but also wanted a new, aluminum clincher rim wheel for everyday use, travel, and Audax.

XDR freehub, DT Swiss 240 classic (J bend) rim brake hub

I could find a DT Swiss 240 "classic" 28-hole hub and DT Swiss RR411 asymmetric rear rim, plus Sapim CX-Ray black spokes, on a German mail order retailer's website. The package arrived within two weeks and I built up the wheel.

The RR411 looks really nicely built. so does the DT Swiss 240 hub. The SRAM XDR cassette attaches really nicely to the freehub -- very secure and easy installation using the same tool as for a Shimano or legacy SRAM freehub. 

I have not used an asymmetric rear rim before, but the idea is that the right and left sides can have more even spoke tension than a typical rear wheel build, where nearly all the tension is on the drive side. In the end, with the wheel tensioned and trued, the right side spokes are around 125kgf and left side around 75-80kgf. In a typical aluminum clincher rear wheel the right would be the same, 120-130kgf, and the left would be I think no more than 50kgf. My hope is that this design, plus the super-strong Sapim CX-Ray spokes and the long, brass spoke nipples that I used, will make this a very strong wheel despite the 28 (vs my usual 32) spokes.

The RR411 is 22mm wide outside, 18mm wide inside, not so different from the H Plus Son Archetype (23mm/17.5mm), but not as wide as many of the rims being made in the past few years for use with 28mm, 30mm or wider tires. (Velocity Aileron rims and Gokiso GD2 rims are 25mm wide on the exterior, the Imezi rims are 26mm). The RR411 width is just fine, as the Ti Travel bike's chain stays do not allow a tire wider than 26-27mm in any event. In recent years, I use a 28mm tire on the front of the bike, for extra comfort, and a 25/26mm rear. I also use a 27.2mm seat post with an adapter for a bit of added flex and comfort, as the bike feels a bit stiff for ultra-endurance with a 30.6 seat post. 

I have DT Swiss 350 hubs on the Imezi wheels, but this is my first experience with the DT Swiss 240 -- the higher-end model, lighter weight for road racing, but I expect very similar in terms of maintenance and durability. The freehub is very quiet.

The fully built wheel, without cassette/tape/skewers, is 838 grams. That is excellent for an aluminum clincher rear wheel. For comparison, Wheel No. 00024 was 913 grams when new. The DT Swiss 240 rear hub is 212 grams (vs 247 for the Dura Ace 9000). There are 28 (vs 32) spokes. And the rim is 435g (vs 485g for the H Plus Son Archetype). I used slightly longer (and heavier, brass) spoke nipples as compared to the aluminum nipples that used to come paired with Sapim CX-Ray spokes. 

And the DT Swiss RR411 rim came with washer-like supports (PHR washers) that  fit around the inside edge of the spoke hole, where the spoke nipple presses into the rim, to compensate for a rim that does not have any grommets around the spoke holes. These supports are wider than the base/head of the spoke nipple and are shaped to fit snuggly into the inside of the rim bed and give additional support around the edge of the spoke hole. 

I used the black brass Sapim Polyax 16mm spoke nipples I ordered with the spokes, rather than the set of DT Swiss silver alloy "Squorx" nipples that came with the rim. I now see some instructions on other retailers' sites to the that the wheels "must be built" with not only the PHR washers but the Squorx spoke nipples. Hmmm. 

Did I mention that, with the right rim tape, the RR411 rims are "tubeless ready"?

The rim, hub, and spokes all made for an easy build. I expect this to be an excellent wheel with which to launch the second decade of the Ti Travel bike! 

10-36 12-speed SRAM Force 1270 Etap AXS hub (with QR skewer inserted). 
With 46-33 crankset and 10-36 cassette, the AXS drivetrain will offer a barely bigger high gear than my current 50-11 compact setup, and a much lower low gear (33-36 vs 34-32)
for spinning up the steepest hills, exhausted and with some gear on the bike.

*Wheel No 00024 now could use another rebuild, after thousands more kilometers. The rim probably could last another few years, though it is showing some wear along the brake tracks. But a number of the bladed spokes have bound up in the spoke nipple or are badly twisted from 6+ years of adjustments, and are essentially stuck. At this point, instead of mixing 7-year old and new spokes, I think it is best to again re-use the Dura Ace hub, with a new replacement H Plus Son rim and a full new set of spokes. Another winter project!

Thank you, Rim

(Reposting here from Feb 26 2019 Facebook post).

Thank you, rim.
You were a beautiful looking H Plus Son 32-hole black rim -- quite something to look at in your younger days. Sure you were only aluminum, you did not have the "bling" factor or aerodynamics of carbon, but let's face it, you were perfect for my kind of riding. You got me through Paris-Brest-Paris in 2015 and many rides since. Your braking surface was very well-worn, concave now. It was already clear that you would not be "part of the bike" for PBP 2019 this summer. But you did get one last chance to prove yourself. You helped me roll smoothly through the Tour de Tasmania 200, 300, 400 and 600km rides this week, qualifying me to return to Paris Brest Paris!