29 " Wheel Comparison - Shimano vs Bontrager

Occasionally I get to demo new products. Over the last two weeks, I have been riding and racing on Shimano's latest 29" MTB wheelset. My reference point consists primarily of my season old Bontrager Race-X Lite Wheels that came with my Gary Fisher Superfly.

After over 100 aggressive MTB miles, the Shimano wheels have held up extremely well. I removed the tires and valve stems and weighed the two wheelsets back to back. Both had stock skewers, tubeless rimstrips (Bontrager wheels only-Shimano doesn't need rim strips for tubeless), stock 160mm rotors, and Shimano XT 11-34 cassettes attached. Amazingly, both wheelsets came in at 2lb 5oz front and 3lb 4oz rear. Although they won't win weight weenie contests, they are light by 29" standards and within 1/2 lb of similarly priced 26" wheelsets.

The hub quality and engagements of both rear wheels feels nearly identical. The Shimano uses a straight pull spoke design (no 90 degree bend at the hub), which supposedly allows higher spoke tension and greater stiffness. Although the spokes are laced noticeably stiff, I was unable to tell the difference in stiffness while riding. The Bontrager wheels require a rimstrip to run tubeless. Shimano seals the spoke holes, so no strip is required. Both systems work flawlessly with tubeless setups. However, Shimano's system seems to make spoke nipple replacement a factory only procedure. In my 20 years of riding bicycles, I have never had to replace spoke nipples, so this shouldn't be an issue.

There were really only 3 noticeable performance differences between the two wheelsets. The bearing drag is slightly higher on the Shimano hubs (possibly due to the relative lack of miles). The closing mechanism feels less stout on the Shimano skewers than the Bonty's. Finally, the Shimano's use centerlock brake rotors instead of 6 bolt. Fortunately the 09 Bonty's now use the lighter and easier removal centerlock design. At $700/set, the Shimano's retail for $200 less/set than the new Bontrager wheels. In conclusion, the lower price and equally performing Shimano's are a great buy for a no fuss high performance cross country wheelset.

Omar

www.ozonexterra.com