Grrr - Mavic Ksyrium Elite rims

[briantrumpet]

It is an extremely poor design from beginning to end. Here's why:

1) Both spoke and nipple are made of aluminium. They seize incredibly quickly.
2) Requires special tools to work on.
3) Requires radial lacing on the right side because the fat spokes, when interlaced will hit the RD cage.
4) In order to transmit torque to the left, driving spokes, the hub has to be abnormally large in diameter. Thin tubes don't transmit torque very well.
5) The rim is threaded to accept the nipples. This thread was created by piercing the rim, from the inside out, with a not tungsten spike. Imagine a soldering iron piercing plastic. Then, the resultant melt-burr, was threaded. This bur is uneven with plenty of stress risers. The cyclical stresses of the spokes loading and unloading with each revolution, causes these sharp edges to propagate cracks to the rim's spoke bed, which is, btw, too thin for its own good.

No engineers were involved in this design. To call it a design is a fallacy, it is more like an idea perpetrated upon a gullible consumer.

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Thanks. That sort of detail in the process does rather reinforce my decision not to bother with replacing this with a Mavic anything. I'm hoping that the Shimano Ultegra engineering is rather more robust - so far, so good, on two bikes. I only started out on the MKEs as they came with my Cannondale SuperSix in 2010, and most people seemed to think they were 'bomb-proof', so I assumed the cracked rim in 2013 was an anomaly. If only I'd asked you...

 

[wonderloaf]

I'll agree that these rims are of poor design. About ten years back I bought a pair of the very similar Aksium wheels and the same thing happened to the rear rim in little over a year.

Where have you been YS? Not a peep from you for ages.

I've just bought a bike with Aksium's fitted, hope they've learnt their lesson and improved the design ... I'll keep a wary eye on my rims anyway!