??Ritchey Z DS wheels???

[toaster]

What about these wheels, Pro or WCS??

Read some bad reviews in the past. Have they gotten better??

Reports of spoke breakage, rear hub noise.

Is there a better Ritchey wheel?

[cs124]

I've got the WCS version, 16/20 spokes, (came with the bike) and have mixed feelings.

I haven't broken any spokes but the rear spoke tension was pretty uneven and the wheel has needed truing a couple of times in 3,000km.

I'm also on my 3rd (!) cassette body. The first started making a godawful dry, metal-on-metal noise after about 2,000km. The replacement was so far out of true I sent it back straight away, unridden. The third is still out of true but less so, and it is already sounding a bit dry and scratchy. The bearings in the rear hub are ok, but nothing special. I've mentioned it here before that they are about as smooth as the 20,000km old Ultegra hubs on my training wheels.

I said before "mixed feelings" and this is why... The front wheel has been great. Never had to true it, bearings spin superbly well and it's pretty light. The fastest "normal" wheel I've ridden.

I think that if I got the rear rim rebuilt with a quality hub and spokes I'd have a decent set of wheels.

WCS is generally Ritchey's "best" range so I'd hate to see some of their cheaper stuff. Oh, I almost forgot, they also sell a carbon wheelset with alloy rim/braking surface that are supposedly made by Zipp. Dunno anything about them though.