Another day of wheel building (and so on). But first.
This is work I did on April 11th of this year
and I didn't write about it at the time,
but I received the front and rear wheels of a WH-RS710 C36 from a customer.
I only photographed the front wheel,
but it's a pre-built wheel laced with kinked spokes.
The front wheel had shifted this much.
Since I did the work in front of the customer,
I didn't necessarily need to keep records,
but it was a wheel that caught my attention, so I took photos.
The model number contains RS (Road Series),
but technically it's classified as a current 105-grade wheel,
and Shimano's website lists it on their 105 page.
I don't know why they didn't call it WH-R7170.
There's a similar model number WH-RS700,
which is an aluminum rim wheel for rim brakes,
and the 700 series is the highest tier outside of regular grades.
From there, they changed the last digit to 70 meaning disc brakes,
creating WH-RS770,
which is a disc brake wheel with carbon-laminate rim
from the previous R8000-series Ultegra generation.
Now it seems like a scam.
When RS770 was followed later by RS710,
RS710 looks like the lower tier,
but the component generation is different by one, so they're different things.
This is a WH-R9270 that I recently rebuilt at my shop,
and the C36 marking is a print,
and when you touch it with your finger, it has very slight thickness.
For Dura-Ace wheels, only the rim height marking gets this finish,
and for Ultegra wheels,
the ULTEGRA marking also gets this same finish.
The DURA-ACE marking on Dura-Ace wheels
isn't quite embossed,
but it definitely has a raised finish.
On the WH-RS710,
the cosmetic finish is as simple as Mavic,
with just one thin rectangular sticker running across the left and right sides of the rim
(plus a WARNING sticker on the left side).
It's like they're saying "go ahead and strip that logo off."
And indeed, on the wheels in the photo at the beginning of this post,
the customer had already peeled off the stickers before bringing them to my shop.
So, the WH-RS710
comes in two rim heights: C32 and C46.
These are 4mm lower than Dura-Ace and Ultegra's C36 and C50,
and they're different rims.
With past Shimano wheels,
the WH-9100-C40
had the WO (clincher) rim version using the same rim as the previous WH-9000-C35,
so while it says C40, it's actually 35mm high,
and the tubular rim version had a model change but was still only 37mm high—
so the model name doesn't necessarily reflect rim height.
I made sure to check this time.
Since Dura-Ace has a tubular (TU) version,
and Ultegra and 105 wheels only come in tubeless (TL) versions,
the TL suffix is added for convenience,
but when I write out the claimed weights of the front wheels of the lower rim height models:
WH-R9270-C36-TL-F 620g
WH-R8170-C36-TL-F 657g
WH-RS710-C32-TL-F 665g
It's like this.
This might just be, well, it might be something.
According to Shimano, the C36 tubeless rims of the R9270 and R8170 are different,
but their weight and max tension limit are the same,
so as wheel components to me,
they're "the same thing" apart from the rim marking.
The hub shell of the R9270's front hub
has abnormally thin center thickness
and is impossibly light for a cup-and-cone hub,
and the R9270's spokes have a lower specific gravity than CX-RAY,
so the front wheel has a 37g difference in non-rim parts.
But between R8170 and RS710, the claimed front wheel weight
differs by only 8g.
If the RS710's 32mm tubeless rim
turns out to be lighter than the R9270/R8170's 36mm tubeless rim,
then it could be the most superior wheel-building material in terms of rebuild premise.
This has been bugging me for a while, so
Another day of wheel building (and so on).
I sourced a WH-RS710.
Starting with the front wheel.
↑The cosmetic sticker on the rim
is just this.
The seal on a baseball cap visor
seems like it would be taken 1000 times more seriously.
Tubeless tape is applied.
Unnecessary fuss...
The spoke head marking is the capital S stamp
commonly seen on Shimano's budget models.
Actual measured weight of the front wheel.
The claimed 665g isn't official propaganda, I suppose, but
the tubeless valve and
tubeless-ready tape excluded,
it was within acceptable range.
Per the usual custom, I left only the final crossing pair of 4 spokes (2 on each side) next to the valve hole
without turning any nipples.
WH-RS710-C32-TL comes with a spare spoke 24-piece kit where
the front and rear have the same part number,
containing 12 pieces of 281.5mm and 12 pieces of 283mm.
The shorter 281.5mm are for front left and rear right,
and the longer 283mm are for front right and rear left.
From the state shown above, pulling the nipples out past the rim
and checking the exposed thread length on the hanging nipples...
↑Left side (rotor mounting side) 281.5mm
↑Right side 283mm
↑Left side 281.5mm
↑Right side 283mm
It's long, but better than the recent WH-R9270.
Actual measured rim weight.
The R8170-C36 rim was around 390g,
so the RS710-C32 rim isn't superior to the higher-tier rim in height-to-weight ratio.
Rather, it's excellent in not being deliberately made heavier just because it's the budget model.
If the rim difference is this small, the hub and spokes should be lighter than I imagined.
↑The opposite side from the blue SHIMANO logo
has this marking.
The front hub for the WH-RS710 kinked spokes is
very similar to the RS470,
which is an RS400-grade disc hub.
But the RS470 doesn't have a 24-hole version.
Why don't they make one?
Both are listed as grade-outside RS Series,
so they have Shimano markings rather than 105 or Tiagra.
Oh, the hub axle material is different...
↑RS710 front hub
↑HB-RS470
While the RS710 hub looks like the RS470 hub,
the spec seems to be a different color version of RS770 (front hub claimed weight 125g),
a 24-hole hub that RS770 doesn't have.
It was lighter than Tni's Revo disc hub
(the centerlock disc cap is removed in the image above).
The claimed weight for this hub is 132g.
↑12 pieces of 281.5mm
↑12 pieces of 283mm
For spokes, oddly the shorter bundle was heavier.
Suspecting a mix-up or contamination, I divided the spokes into 12-piece bundles without trying to separate by length,
and measured each with a spoke gauge—the batches were indeed clearly different lengths by 12 pieces each.
↑Right side of both images shows the shorter spokes,
and the shorter ones had longer 14-gauge plain sections.
The spoke specific gravity is 63.2÷281.5÷12÷0.0257=0.727988...,
and for 283mm it's
62.7÷283÷12÷0.0257=0.718400..., so
about 72%, which seems reasonable.
This is roughly the same spoke specific gravity as R8170's straight spokes.
I can't say whether they're from the same manufacturer,
but ignoring kinked-spoke break risk and rust susceptibility differences,
you could consider them the kinked-spoke version of R8170 spokes.
They fall between CX-RAY and CX Sprint in spoke specific gravity,
and apart from makeshift measures, neither spoke type can repair them—that's the downside.
For this wheel rebuild, though,
I'm using reparable spokes.
Next, the rear wheel.
Unlike WH-R9270/R8170,
the rear wheel isn't laced 2:1.
So if you're buying WH-RS710 as rebuild material,
for building with a Revo disc hub, get two front wheels,
or if you're reusing the hub front and rear, get a complete pair.
The front wheel—either someone terrible built it
or the grip flats on the nipples were completely stripped,
so carefully disassembling it (wanting to know the spoke specific gravity)
was a real hassle, but the rear wasn't as bad.
I found what I wanted to know, so I loosened tension and cut it.
↑WH-RS710 rear hub
↑Revo disc hub
It's hopeless for a steel freebody hub
to compete with an aluminum freebody hub.
Actual measured rear rim weight.
It fluctuated between 407g and 408g,
but since it's heavier than the front's 406g, I'll consider the rims the same
(deciding there's no front-rear manufacturing difference)
and swap the front and rear rims during rebuild.
Rebuilt it.
Front wheel: Revo disc hub, 24-hole,
black half CX Sprint, 64-spoke reverse Italian lacing, with bracing.
Flip it over...
and across from the valve hole is the blue Shimano marking,
aligned with the hub shell visible through the valve hole is the Tni logo.
For them to be built properly,
the two should roughly be on the same line,
but in this image they're clearly offset.
The hub shell visible through the valve hole
can't be adjusted continuously,
so I laced with it as close as possible.
Meanwhile, the sticker, which should be infinitely adjustable,
is clearly offset from the center line between rim holes.
This is now the front wheel, but as you can see from the post history,
the misaligned sticker was originally on the rear wheel.
As I mentioned, I swapped the front and rear rims.
Rear wheel: Revo disc hub, 24-hole,
black half Campagnolo 46-spoke JIS lacing, with bracing.
The hub shell logo and rim sticker phase
appear roughly aligned to the eye, and
the sticker is centered between the rim holes.
This is something I recently learned:
R9270 and everything else have different nipple specs.
The overall nipple length is the same,
but the R9270 nipple on the right in the image
has a longer inner section (toward the hub) and shorter outer section (toward the rim).
↑This is today's RS710 nipple,
and nearly all had completely stripped outer hex grips.
I don't know how it is now,
but Shimano's Dura-Ace grade wheels
are supposedly only touched by the top-rated factory workers
in their four-tier evaluation system, the "superior" grade,
so all other (lower) grade wheels
are the apprentices' practice material.
Well, that can't be helped.
As I mentioned, especially the front wheel nipples
were thoroughly stripped,
so to disassemble I grabbed the inner section (same grip width as generic nipples)
and took it apart.
For rebuilding, I didn't reuse the original nipples
and went with DT black aluminum nipples.
↑With calipers like this
The R9270 on the right,
right—that makes sense, when the spokes are longer,
the protrusion past the nipple looks greater.
So that length wasn't abnormal...
No, even so, that's weird.
For the front and rear wheels I rebuilt today,
I'm offering one pair at a special limited price.
Normally the WH-RS710 price
plus Revo disc hub, spokes, and nipple costs
plus labor would apply, and whether the original WH-RS710 comes from my inventory or the customer's,
I'd return the original hub,
but this time I still have things I want to investigate with the original hub,
so instead of a swap I'm doing a trade-in for the Revo disc hub
and discounting labor as my study fee
(the workplace slang meaning of "discount"),
so instead of the regular retail price of ¥155,100 tax-included,
these front and rear wheels are ¥147,000 tax-included.
If you're interested, please visit us or call.
September 15 Update:
They sold.
Much appreciated. (Genpeito Kimagassen)
If you don't need immediate delivery,
for orders placed by the end of this month
I can prepare the same wheels at the same price.
Please consider it.
The sticker on the rim has already been peeled off in this image,
but if I peel it, the labor is ¥10,000 per rim.
If you do it yourself, it's free.
This is work I did on April 11th of this year
and I didn't write about it at the time,
but I received the front and rear wheels of a WH-RS710 C36 from a customer.
I only photographed the front wheel,
but it's a pre-built wheel laced with kinked spokes.
The front wheel had shifted this much.
Since I did the work in front of the customer,
I didn't necessarily need to keep records,
but it was a wheel that caught my attention, so I took photos.
The model number contains RS (Road Series),
but technically it's classified as a current 105-grade wheel,
and Shimano's website lists it on their 105 page.
I don't know why they didn't call it WH-R7170.
There's a similar model number WH-RS700,
which is an aluminum rim wheel for rim brakes,
and the 700 series is the highest tier outside of regular grades.
From there, they changed the last digit to 70 meaning disc brakes,
creating WH-RS770,
which is a disc brake wheel with carbon-laminate rim
from the previous R8000-series Ultegra generation.
When RS770 was followed later by RS710,
RS710 looks like the lower tier,
but the component generation is different by one, so they're different things.
This is a WH-R9270 that I recently rebuilt at my shop,
and the C36 marking is a print,
and when you touch it with your finger, it has very slight thickness.
For Dura-Ace wheels, only the rim height marking gets this finish,
and for Ultegra wheels,
the ULTEGRA marking also gets this same finish.
The DURA-ACE marking on Dura-Ace wheels
isn't quite embossed,
but it definitely has a raised finish.
On the WH-RS710,
the cosmetic finish is as simple as Mavic,
with just one thin rectangular sticker running across the left and right sides of the rim
(plus a WARNING sticker on the left side).
It's like they're saying "go ahead and strip that logo off."
And indeed, on the wheels in the photo at the beginning of this post,
the customer had already peeled off the stickers before bringing them to my shop.
So, the WH-RS710
comes in two rim heights: C32 and C46.
These are 4mm lower than Dura-Ace and Ultegra's C36 and C50,
and they're different rims.
With past Shimano wheels,
the WH-9100-C40
had the WO (clincher) rim version using the same rim as the previous WH-9000-C35,
so while it says C40, it's actually 35mm high,
and the tubular rim version had a model change but was still only 37mm high—
so the model name doesn't necessarily reflect rim height.
I made sure to check this time.
Since Dura-Ace has a tubular (TU) version,
and Ultegra and 105 wheels only come in tubeless (TL) versions,
the TL suffix is added for convenience,
but when I write out the claimed weights of the front wheels of the lower rim height models:
WH-R9270-C36-TL-F 620g
WH-R8170-C36-TL-F 657g
WH-RS710-C32-TL-F 665g
It's like this.
This might just be, well, it might be something.
According to Shimano, the C36 tubeless rims of the R9270 and R8170 are different,
but their weight and max tension limit are the same,
so as wheel components to me,
they're "the same thing" apart from the rim marking.
The hub shell of the R9270's front hub
has abnormally thin center thickness
and is impossibly light for a cup-and-cone hub,
and the R9270's spokes have a lower specific gravity than CX-RAY,
so the front wheel has a 37g difference in non-rim parts.
But between R8170 and RS710, the claimed front wheel weight
differs by only 8g.
If the RS710's 32mm tubeless rim
turns out to be lighter than the R9270/R8170's 36mm tubeless rim,
then it could be the most superior wheel-building material in terms of rebuild premise.
This has been bugging me for a while, so
Another day of wheel building (and so on).
I sourced a WH-RS710.
Starting with the front wheel.
↑The cosmetic sticker on the rim
is just this.
The seal on a baseball cap visor
seems like it would be taken 1000 times more seriously.
Tubeless tape is applied.
Unnecessary fuss...
The spoke head marking is the capital S stamp
commonly seen on Shimano's budget models.
Actual measured weight of the front wheel.
The claimed 665g isn't official propaganda, I suppose, but
the tubeless valve and
tubeless-ready tape excluded,
it was within acceptable range.
Per the usual custom, I left only the final crossing pair of 4 spokes (2 on each side) next to the valve hole
without turning any nipples.
WH-RS710-C32-TL comes with a spare spoke 24-piece kit where
the front and rear have the same part number,
containing 12 pieces of 281.5mm and 12 pieces of 283mm.
The shorter 281.5mm are for front left and rear right,
and the longer 283mm are for front right and rear left.
From the state shown above, pulling the nipples out past the rim
and checking the exposed thread length on the hanging nipples...
↑Left side (rotor mounting side) 281.5mm
↑Right side 283mm
↑Left side 281.5mm
↑Right side 283mm
It's long, but better than the recent WH-R9270.
Actual measured rim weight.
The R8170-C36 rim was around 390g,
so the RS710-C32 rim isn't superior to the higher-tier rim in height-to-weight ratio.
Rather, it's excellent in not being deliberately made heavier just because it's the budget model.
If the rim difference is this small, the hub and spokes should be lighter than I imagined.
↑The opposite side from the blue SHIMANO logo
has this marking.
The front hub for the WH-RS710 kinked spokes is
very similar to the RS470,
which is an RS400-grade disc hub.
But the RS470 doesn't have a 24-hole version.
Both are listed as grade-outside RS Series,
so they have Shimano markings rather than 105 or Tiagra.
Oh, the hub axle material is different...
↑RS710 front hub
↑HB-RS470
While the RS710 hub looks like the RS470 hub,
the spec seems to be a different color version of RS770 (front hub claimed weight 125g),
a 24-hole hub that RS770 doesn't have.
It was lighter than Tni's Revo disc hub
(the centerlock disc cap is removed in the image above).
The claimed weight for this hub is 132g.
↑12 pieces of 281.5mm
↑12 pieces of 283mm
For spokes, oddly the shorter bundle was heavier.
Suspecting a mix-up or contamination, I divided the spokes into 12-piece bundles without trying to separate by length,
and measured each with a spoke gauge—the batches were indeed clearly different lengths by 12 pieces each.
↑Right side of both images shows the shorter spokes,
and the shorter ones had longer 14-gauge plain sections.
The spoke specific gravity is 63.2÷281.5÷12÷0.0257=0.727988...,
and for 283mm it's
62.7÷283÷12÷0.0257=0.718400..., so
about 72%, which seems reasonable.
This is roughly the same spoke specific gravity as R8170's straight spokes.
I can't say whether they're from the same manufacturer,
but ignoring kinked-spoke break risk and rust susceptibility differences,
you could consider them the kinked-spoke version of R8170 spokes.
They fall between CX-RAY and CX Sprint in spoke specific gravity,
and apart from makeshift measures, neither spoke type can repair them—that's the downside.
For this wheel rebuild, though,
I'm using reparable spokes.
Next, the rear wheel.
Unlike WH-R9270/R8170,
the rear wheel isn't laced 2:1.
So if you're buying WH-RS710 as rebuild material,
for building with a Revo disc hub, get two front wheels,
or if you're reusing the hub front and rear, get a complete pair.
The front wheel—either someone terrible built it
or the grip flats on the nipples were completely stripped,
so carefully disassembling it (wanting to know the spoke specific gravity)
was a real hassle, but the rear wasn't as bad.
I found what I wanted to know, so I loosened tension and cut it.
↑WH-RS710 rear hub
↑Revo disc hub
It's hopeless for a steel freebody hub
to compete with an aluminum freebody hub.
Actual measured rear rim weight.
It fluctuated between 407g and 408g,
but since it's heavier than the front's 406g, I'll consider the rims the same
(deciding there's no front-rear manufacturing difference)
and swap the front and rear rims during rebuild.
Rebuilt it.
Front wheel: Revo disc hub, 24-hole,
black half CX Sprint, 64-spoke reverse Italian lacing, with bracing.
Flip it over...
and across from the valve hole is the blue Shimano marking,
aligned with the hub shell visible through the valve hole is the Tni logo.
For them to be built properly,
the two should roughly be on the same line,
but in this image they're clearly offset.
The hub shell visible through the valve hole
can't be adjusted continuously,
so I laced with it as close as possible.
Meanwhile, the sticker, which should be infinitely adjustable,
is clearly offset from the center line between rim holes.
This is now the front wheel, but as you can see from the post history,
the misaligned sticker was originally on the rear wheel.
As I mentioned, I swapped the front and rear rims.
Rear wheel: Revo disc hub, 24-hole,
black half Campagnolo 46-spoke JIS lacing, with bracing.
The hub shell logo and rim sticker phase
appear roughly aligned to the eye, and
the sticker is centered between the rim holes.
This is something I recently learned:
R9270 and everything else have different nipple specs.
The overall nipple length is the same,
but the R9270 nipple on the right in the image
has a longer inner section (toward the hub) and shorter outer section (toward the rim).
↑This is today's RS710 nipple,
and nearly all had completely stripped outer hex grips.
I don't know how it is now,
but Shimano's Dura-Ace grade wheels
are supposedly only touched by the top-rated factory workers
in their four-tier evaluation system, the "superior" grade,
so all other (lower) grade wheels
are the apprentices' practice material.
Well, that can't be helped.
As I mentioned, especially the front wheel nipples
were thoroughly stripped,
so to disassemble I grabbed the inner section (same grip width as generic nipples)
and took it apart.
For rebuilding, I didn't reuse the original nipples
and went with DT black aluminum nipples.
↑With calipers like this
The R9270 on the right,
right—that makes sense, when the spokes are longer,
the protrusion past the nipple looks greater.
So that length wasn't abnormal...
No, even so, that's weird.
For the front and rear wheels I rebuilt today,
I'm offering one pair at a special limited price.
Normally the WH-RS710 price
plus Revo disc hub, spokes, and nipple costs
plus labor would apply, and whether the original WH-RS710 comes from my inventory or the customer's,
I'd return the original hub,
but this time I still have things I want to investigate with the original hub,
so instead of a swap I'm doing a trade-in for the Revo disc hub
and discounting labor as my study fee
(the workplace slang meaning of "discount"),
so instead of the regular retail price of ¥155,100 tax-included,
these front and rear wheels are ¥147,000 tax-included.
If you're interested, please visit us or call.
September 15 Update:
They sold.
Much appreciated. (Genpeito Kimagassen)
If you don't need immediate delivery,
for orders placed by the end of this month
I can prepare the same wheels at the same price.
Please consider it.
The sticker on the rim has already been peeled off in this image,
but if I peel it, the labor is ¥10,000 per rim.
If you do it yourself, it's free.