Item:  Zipp 400 Front and Rear Tubular Wheelset (Shimano)

Description:  This is a deep rimmed wheelset that is used for windy or technical time-trial conditions

Price:  $300 (shipped)

Where to Buy:  eBay

Review:

I purchased these wheels off of eBay, which can be a good or bad thing.  You always have that little voice in the back of your head saying, is that wheel really “true” or “undamaged”?  Fortunately for me, the wheels arrived to me just fine.  I think that is part of the reason why I’m so happy with these wheels.  Great product for great value.  These wheels are of the older style from Zipp.  This is a good and bad thing as well.  The good is that they were the right price (less than $150 for both front and back wheels).  The bad news is that the tires were pretty warn.  Sew-ups are not the cheapest tires in the bike world.

The other problem that I had with these wheels is that the spokes were pretty old and where made of titanium.  This would have been cool if they were new.  However, after six months of usage, two of the spokes sheered at the nipple.  I later found out that the rear hub design with the deep dish rim made it next to impossible to find replacement spokes.  In the end, I had to have spokes custom made and the rear wheel ended up being a tad heavier and less aerodynamic (non-bladed spokes).  I ended up paying $120 parts and labor for the fix because they replaced all the spokes.  To this day, I have yet to clean the rim up and glue a new set of tires on the rim.

Having said all that, I’m stoked about these wheels and the way that they perform.  They are fast.  You feel a lot of the road when time-trialing and that’s a good thing (for me anyway).  There is very little flex to them when cornering and the handling is very precise.  Braking is difficult because I am not running a cork pad for the carbon rims.  This is a little bit nerve racking when it comes to predictability, but other than that I know what I’m getting myself into.  The speed is well worth the sacrifice.  On that note, because I’m running on the original brake setup from Zipp (on the Zipp2001 bike), the brakes do not support cork style pads.

I recommend these wheels and can only imagine that the other deep rim wheels that Zipp puts out are only better.

Rating: (1-10; with 10 being the best) 8.5