Cole C58 Lite Clincher Review

Reviewer: Cycling Weekly

28-Jun-2012 | 1 Review

Rating:

£1,099.99 (at time of review)

Pros

Very stiff

Cons

Brake blocks

See verdict and spec

In the world of competitive cycling, deep-section carbon wheels are ubiquitous. Road races, time trials and the front end of Continental sportives (even the hilliest) are dominated by hoops with a 50mm-plus profile and made from the black stuff

Cole's wheels may well have a fairly standard profile all-carbon clincher rim, but the spoking pattern and design is far from normal.

Dubbed DSA, this Dynamic Spoke Alignment is the system Cole has developed to allow for very high spoke tension in its wheels. Small brass barrels are supported by canted flange ribs, and are able to rotate.

By eliminating the J-bend, the spoke can deal with far more tension and supporting the spoke tension over the twin ribs allows for even more. In the lab, the front wheel was laterally very stiff and this did play out on the road, with a solid wheel in the corners and when sprinting.

On the rear the same feeling was apparent on the road. The wheels still accelerated well and lent themselves to aggressive riding. Sadly, the supplied brake blocks didn't do a great deal in the way of stopping power, so if you do plump for the C58 Lites, you'll need to factor in a decent set of carbon blocks.

Verdict

It's not often something that appears to be different for the sake of it comes good on the road: with the C58s it really was as much about the go as the show.

Lab test results>>

Full specification

Weight

1,812.4g

Supplier

www.evanscycles.com

User reviews

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MICHAEL MARTIN

April 09 06:17

I've just bought a new set of these and can not give you a ride review but I did notice that your review had the weight listed at 1670.2 g while the Reynolds website has the weight at 1565 g. Here is the link to Reynolds - http://www.reynoldscycling.com/index.php?p_resource=items_wheels_item&p_itm_pk=673