Poor Man's Product Review - Powerway Solohomer Pro Wheelset

On road, I ride a Specialized Tarmac Comp, it's nothing super flashy but at the time of purchase I considered it a good frame to build on.  Turns out, since the time of purchase, I haven't had a much money to throw at it.  I wanted to lighten it up a little but as I'm sure you all know, it can be an expensive process.

One of the best ways to lighten up a bike (and reduce rotating mass, giving the bike a livelier feel) is to upgrade the wheels.  As you probably also know; new, light wheels are expensive - yes you can build your own but let's consider the cost of building a lightweight wheelset;.hubs $180, rims $250, spokes (say 20/24) $66 for silver straight gauge spokes and you're looking at a minimum of $496, more if you're not going to build them yourself.

I faced this conundrum recently and even though I can build my own wheels, it's not something I've ever done often and not something I'm confident in my ability to do well so I started looking at complete wheelsets.

Factory built, complete wheelsets were once an expensive, boutique option, now they're the norm with custom wheels the exception.  There are a staggering number of complete wheelsets on the market that range from $150 to $7000.

Long story short, I started looking for a complete wheelset that had to tick a few boxes - they had to be below my limit of $400 (I had to sell off some of my old bike bits for that) had to be lighter than my stock Shimano RS-10 wheelset at 1,800g and finally had to be able to support me (I'm 92kg and 189cm or 202lbs and 6'3" for the Yanks).

Eventually, I stumbled upon the Powerway Solohomer Pro wheelset (AKA: Powerway R500).

I was a little dubious about buying an unknown brand of wheels from Taiwan but realised that 90% of bike parts within my price range were manufactured there, as was my bike and I soon got over it.  I also noticed an amazing similarity between these wheels and a wheelset sold in Australia under the Token brand..

I researched a bit more and found the following features that agreed with me; sealed hubs, 4 rear, 2 front, a sensible spoke count of 20 front, 24 rear (with 2 spares included), straight pull spokes, no snapping spoke elbows thank you very much and a 6-pawl freehub with 36 engagement points.

I checked the claimed weight of 1,585g and decided to fork out the money.

Which leads to the business end, I purchased my wheels from The Cycleway Bicycle Shop in Hong Kong - a long time favourite shop of mine, they ship fast and have great prices but an inconsistent inventory.  Cycleway had the wheels for USD$279 with USD$50 delivery which came in at AUD$361.

Once delivered, I opened the box eagerly and was not disappointed, they looked great, black rims, white spokes and anodised red hubs.  I put them on the scales (with tape but without the included steel quick releases) and lo and behold, 1,640g - now I was a little disappointed.  I spun the wheels, holding the axles - very smooth, spun for ages, happy again, I checked the rear wheel's freehub, not stiff, loud and as the front wheel did, it spun very well.

A quick fiddle with two 5mm allen keys removes the end caps of the hubs and allows you to remove & replace the bearings and remove the freehub, all looks good.

Without further ado, I mounted some tyres and set about riding.

The first test was a ride to the 1 in 20, a famous Melbourne hill climb, an 80km round trip from my home.  It was a rough ride there over varied road surfaces, the wheels held up perfectly, even though I was a little terrified they were going to taco underneath me.

Eventually, we arrived at the base of the climb.  Now I'm not the world's greatest rider but I'm a decent climber, I tend to be able to push big gears and monster my way up climbs.  Under my weight, most wheels tend to flex or make noise when climbing.  Again, the wheels performed well, with no noticeable flex or rubbing on the brake blocks.

Coming down, I was again a little cautious about the strength of the wheelset but they made it home and were still perfectly true after the first ride.

It's now been six months and about 6,000km (3,750 miles for the metrically challenged) of all sorts of riding; commuting (with a 10kg bag), weekend centuries and even a triathlon.  I've lost a little tension in the spokes, nothing a quick turn with a spoke key couldn't fix and the wheels are still going strong.

I'm very happy with my purchase, the wheels have performed very well, over the last half-year, a good way to save 200g of rotating mass.

My only beef with this wheelset is the difference between claimed & actual weights - although underquoting weights is standard in the bike industry, it still annoys the crap out of me..

Overall, I'd recommend these wheels to anyone on a limited budget who wants to replace a wheelset at the RS-10 or Mavic Aksium level.with something a little lighter and stiffer.

Cheap performance upgrades >$100 AUD

Yes, I'm an Australian, so less than $100 AUD (Australian dollars for the uninitiated) is about (as I type) $89 USD (US dollars) or £60 GBP (whatever that stands for?).

I'll break this down between both, road and mountain.

Both:

Odyssey Linear Slic Kable; (Yes, that's how BMX'ers spell stuff) - If you run any cable actuated brake then you need this. The linear housing is extremely stiff and transfers loads of power to the calipers, if you're unhappy with your mechanical disc, V-brake, cantilever or road brakes, try this cable housing & see what happens. It's the poor man's Nokon cable. Comes in loads of colours too - I use this on both roadies and my singlespeed 29er - my 26" mtb has hydraulics so I don't use it there.

Kool Stop brake pads; (more poor spelling) the Salmon pads are fantastic, no matter what application, especially in the wet (funny that, as they're designed as a wet weather pad). They're rougher on your rims but if you're as frustrated with the poor performance of road calipers next to to discs then I recommend you try them paired with Odyssey cable.

XTR Gear Cables; XTR cable will spice up any drivetrain and make it punch above it's weight.  The full inner & outer kit is best but even just the inners will improve poor shifting.  Of course, if your shifting is really that bad, then it may be another issue altogether.

Road Specific

KCNC Ti Pro lite seatpost - at almost half the weight of a Thomson and just as stiff, you can't go wrong with this item. If you already have a carbon frame, then an alloy seatpost is a good upgrade, carbon posts on carbon frames are just too noodlely for me. If I were running an alloy frame, I'd run a Thomson or a KCNC rather than a carbon post.

SwissStop Flash pads; These just sneak in, because in Australia, a set of four costs $99AUD! I Found these because I borrowed a set of carbon tubular wheels for my roadie and needed some carbon specific pads, they work for both carbon and aluminium rims very well. I recently bought a pair of weight-weenie type brakes which worked quite poorly (review coming in the near future), the addition of these pads to my brakes made them stop as well as my 105 brakes (but not as well as my centaurs).

MTB specific

Diatech Anchor Disc Brakes - Wow, I miss my Diatech's, they were fantastic, no-nonsense performers. I had a set on a bike that was stolen and I would happily give up the bike to keep these brakes. I bought a pair on Fleabay for $95AUD delivered and cannot rave enough about them. The only negative is that as they're quite powerful, you need to relax more than usual at the lever.

And that's enough for now, more bargain bits coming soon.

Have a great weekend riding.

Hello, welcome to my blog thingy.

Yes, my ego is that large I think people will want to read what I have to say.

What's this all about? This is a blog for the cyclist who can't afford the best gear but still wants performance.

Why listen to me? My wife and I have a mortgage, 1.5 kids, two cats, five bikes (four are mine) and a single income. I can't afford the best but I love cycling.

Keith Bontrager is often quoted as saying 'Strong, light, cheap. Pick two" well I reckon that out there, you can find all three - you just have to look.

I used to work in the cycling industry - at the blunt end of course, so I know a cone spanner from a tyre lever. Also, I'll be blogging about real products, that I've actually used, in the real world.

I'll post up bargains, bargain-hunting tips and the odd bit of 'holy shit, look how expensive this is!'. And maybe some dumb, random pictures and videos too.

I'll also be blogging about bike maintenance on the cheap, cheap fixes for jobs where expensive specific tools are often recommended. I'm no Sheldon Brown but I try.

I ride mountain and road - both geared and singlespeed. So the majority of posts will appeal to both the leg-shaving and baggy short crowd. As a parent, I'll also be talking about products for cycling parents, kids bikes, seats and the like.

I hope you enjoy my blog and I hope I have enough time to write the bloody thing.

If anyone does stumble across this first post on the world wide interweb and you think the premise is vaguely interesting, feel free to post up what you'd like to hear about.

Thanks for reading.

Cyclopath