3T Discus C35 Team wheelset

Italian company 3T has been ramping up its wheel range for several years, and for 2016 it's stepped into the disc brake market with the all-new Discus range of disc-specific wheels. This Discus C35 Team wheelset offers top-level performance, good stiffness and a competitive weight.

The Discus C35 Team wheelset is the mid-range offering, and features carbon fibre rims wide enough to accommodate the latest wide tyres, and hubs with modular end-caps to accept any of the current wheel axle systems being used by the latest disc-equipped road bikes.

> Contact your nearest 3T dealer to order – find yours here 

The rims are constructed from high modulus carbon fibre and, with no brake track, the shape is very rounded from the bead edge to the nipple holes.

The rims are 32mm deep and 25mm wide, with an internal width of 18mm, making the rim walls a chunky 3.5mm thick. That's a generous width, but the minimum of what we'd expect in a modern wheelset, as the trend is very much for wider tyres and rims.

What these clincher rims aren't is tubeless-compatible, which to my mind is a missed opportunity. Tubeless is gaining more acceptance every year and tyres are getting better all the time.

With no agreed axle standard on the many disc brake-equipped road bikes coming to market, 3T has wisely developed hubs with interchangeable modular end-caps. This is common on mountain bike wheelsets. With no tools required, the hubs can be made compatible with regular quick release bikes or bolt-thru axles (12 and 15mm at the front, 135x12mm and 142x12mm at the rear, covering every 'standard' currently in use). Swapping end-caps is an easy job and makes them a smart investment for the future.

The rear hub has a freehub that is compatible with Shimano and SRAM 10/11-speed cassettes, and there's a Campagnolo version available. If you're using a single-ring SRAM 1x drivetrain you're limited to an 11-36t cassette, as there is no SRAM XD driver body option (which would let you run a 10-42t 11-speed cassette).

The disc rotors are attached to the hubs using Shimano's CenterLock standard, with an adapter if you want to fit a 6-bolt rotor to the wheels.

The hubs and rims are laced together with double-butted aero Pillar spokes, with 24 in both wheels. It's usual to have more spokes in a disc brake wheel to deal with the extra forces. The spokes are straight pull (rather than J-bend) with asymmetric rim drilling designed to reduce the spoke tension between the drive side and non-drive side. The spoke nipples are hidden in the rims, a win for aesthetics but bad for easy maintenance. Luckily I didn't have to take a spoke key to the wheels during the test period.

With the hubs in plain old quick release setup and without the skewers, the wheelset weighs 1,550g (720g front, 830g rear), heavier than 3T's claimed 1,425g. If weight is a concern, the Ltd Edition models save a bit of weight (claimed 1,350g, and with CeramicSpeed bearings) but make a bigger dent on your bank balance (£TBA). And if your budget won't stretch to either of these wheelsets, 3T is offering the Pro wheelset with an aluminium rim (£TBA).

Performance: Really good ride quality and wide tyre compatibility

I took advantage of the wide rim and fitted a pair of 27mm Challenge Paris-Roubaix tyres, and with regular quick release axles, slotted the wheels into the Bowman Pilgrims I've been riding for a few months. I've put a lot of miles on this bike and have used different wheelsets, including Stan's NoTubes ZTR Grail aluminium wheels and Zipp 303 disc wheels, so I've got some good benchmarks for comparison.

The first thing I noticed after fitting these wheels is just how responsive and lively the bike felt. The wheels give the bike an extra level of tautness, whether sprinting out of slow corners, accelerating over the brow of a hill or winching up a steep ascent. Even with regular quick releases, there's no noticeable flex or disc brake rub from the front end when leaning very heavily on the handlebar, such as when scaling a 25% climb in the lowest gear, suggesting a very high level of stiffness.

The wheels display good aerodynamic performance too. Of course, there's no road.cc wind-tunnel to validate the aero efficiency, but the seat of the chamois sensation is very telling, especially compared with the deeper section Zipp 303 wheels. At lower speeds, the 3T Discus wheels have the edge, and it's only at very high speeds where the Zipps gain an advantage. I rode the 3Ts in a wide range of conditions, and the low-profile rim and blunt shape deals with strong crosswinds very well, making them more usable than the Zipps.

They're very tough wheels too, and will also suit gravel and adventure bikes, and even cyclo-cross bikes. They've dealt with high impact strikes from rocks and holes when taken off-road, and on the road, with a 27mm tyre, they're silky smooth, soaking up a lot of the small vibrations that can otherwise unsettle a smooth ride.

> Check out our guide to the best disc brake road bikes here

Durability has been excellent. The spokes have stayed well tensioned with not a squeak of noise from the wheels throughout the test period. The wheels are very smart looking too, it has to be said, the stealth graphics should look great on any bike and go well with the tan sidewalls of the Challenge tyres.

With the aftermarket disc brake carbon wheel market starting to expand as the disc road bike market matures, there are some really good upgrade choices if you want to inject more performance or drop some weight from your disc road bike. With their top-level performance, good stiffness and competitive weight – even if it's heavier than claimed – 3T's Discus C35 Team wheelset should be seriously considered.

Verdict

Fast, strong and reasonably light carbon fibre disc brake wheels with futureproofed hubs