What's the current thinking on a solid/durable wheel build?
 

My White Industries T11 hubs laced to HED Belgiums have been giving me problems (the rear in particular. pulled a spoke out of the rim, so the rim is shot, and rear hub has been suspect, though could possibly have just been bad bearings. Either way, needs to be rebuilt and not too keen on rebuilding with the same hub)

Options are, build a new rear with the same set up, or go with something new.

I care most about durability/reliability -- 32/32 or 28/32.

What are people liking these days?

32/32 Record hubs to archetypes.

lifetime hubs do damned good rims

Shimano drive train :(

I should add. I do about 1/3 of my riding on dirt roads, and the rest on crappy new england paved roads.

those freehubs are readily available.

but alternatively, and believe me, it's hard to say this as a campy guy - dura ace hubs are absolutely perfection IMO.

super easy to adjust and excellent bearings. you could easily keep a set of DA hubs going for longer than you'll be cycling. they're spendy, but worth every penny.

DT R460 rims on those hubs, Matt.

DT Swiss hubs.

Not sure what the best rims are, but Archetypes are good. There must be better ones now though, plus Archetypes are not as wide as they could be.

Ultegra hub and Mavic A719.

DT350, Record, shimano hubs laced to DT, Velocity Or H+Son rims using Sapim Race Or DT Comp spokes, 32/32 laced 3 cross, brass nipps.

Record 32h hubs laced to Kinlin XR-31T rims have been built proof for my 105kg girth riding rough pot hole strewn Baja tarmac and sandy ranch roads the past year.

Kinda surprising you'd have issues with the Belgiums. That's been my go to excellent durability rim for years.

I would not be looking at the HED Belgium rim if you pulled a spoke through it, good rims. I would be more inclined to look at unequal/high spoke tension from a poor initial build, lack of wheel/spoke maintenance or just plain bad luck hitting an obstruction.

Yea! 1000 Posts!

For me it’s the same as it always was: 32 spoke, 3x, 15/16 double butted, with brass nipples. I use HED belgiums too, and have never had issues with my wheels going out of true.

Campy Record 32/32 w/Ambrosio Excellight rims. Bombproof.

Yeah, it was never out of true. Several times in the past year, I was having the lateral play and my guy (a very capable guy, not the original builder, but knows the original builder, and the original builder was very well regarded also) measured tensions and could never find a problem. Working hypothesis was a bad set of bearings. The rim failure is probably unrelated, and just hitting a pothole or something.

A big milestone. I remember mine :)

See above. He's checked the tensions a number of times. I think the rim failure was probably just a freak occurrence. Wheels had 15,000 miles... so not like they're new.

Yes, that's why I went with this build to begin with (WI T11, HED Belgiums, 32/32 3x). The hubs and rims have excellent reputations and the build was intended to be bombproof. I am inclined to chalk the hub issues and the rim failure up to just bad luck. And build a new wheel with the same set up.

But before I do, I figured I'd see if there is a better "bomb proof" build that people are using these days.

DT350s to archetypes