Budget Wheels

Seems like the cheap wheel topic is coming up more with there being better options than ever. It’s enticing to see carbon wheels with a good reputation for sub $700. I bought a set of elite wheels to have as backups for my I9 1/1 carbon ULs. When I bought the I9s I did a ton of research. With the Elites, I knew I’d probably find some bad reviews out there, but being a back up set, I was OK rolling the dice. They arrived on a Tuesday and I rode them on Saturday to see how they compared. Out of the gate I was blown away. They were only 100g heavier than my I9s and they rode great. Until I hit mile 14. Reddit won’t let me post video and photos together but I completely stripped out my ratchets on the first ride. Had a 7 mile, 1500’ vert walk back to my truck. Disassembled at home and was floored to find such garbage internals. They look great on the outside. Don’t look on the inside. I ended up finding tons of posts with similar experiences. Easiest fix is finding a combination of springs and spacers to drop in DT 54T’s. They work great now but at this point, I could have just spent another $250 or so and gotten a set of wheels built and/or supported in the US. Elite’s solution was to send me another set of junk metal ratchets or a $50 refund and $50 elite gift card. Total joke. When you look at DT ratchets next to Elite ratchets, you can’t help but wonder why they were willing to cut corners there. ZERO comparison.
Again, sure lots of people have had good luck with them. Just like people have had good luck with Kia cars. If this is your go-to wheel set, I’d think long and hard about finding other places to maybe save a buck. No other part of your bike works harder.