Shakedown Cruise

I just finished building a new Niner One 9 single speed and I’m extremely happy with the way it turned out. Final weigh in today puts the bike at almost exactly 21 pounds, not record setting by any means, but pretty darned good. I kept the weight down by using Next SL carbon cranks, a Fox Factory fork, and carbon wheels.

The wheels are easily my favorite new part, I went with some super wide carbon rims from a Chinese company which Pimpbot recommended called “Light-Bicycle”… yeah seems a bit shifty but a lot of people I know have had good luck with their wheels so I took a gamble. The wheels are super light weight, 1600 grams, and extremely wide, with an inside diameter of 30mm (almost 1.2”).

The wide rims push out the sidewalls of the tires, they are a bit wider where the rubber hits the dirt, and because the air volume is much higher, I can run them at lower pressure. And that’s exactly what I did, all the way down to about 20-25PSI which is pretty low for me. The result on ride quality was pretty great, super traction and the wheels were so compliant it almost felt like I had suspension in the back.

I love the bike and the new wheels in particular. I’ll try and give a more in depth review of the wheels after a bit more riding, but so far it’s a big thumbs up from me.