Grooved up wheels... '09 Redline Conquest

[RiceBurner]

Bought a used '09 Redline Conquest CX bike. Wheels are pretty ground up where brakes touch from the previous owner riding gravel. Any recommendations for a replacement set of wheels(700x34c). Equal or a little better than what's on it(Ritchie DS Comp). Recommend a brake pad? Also it's disc brake ready, frame wise, anybody have experience with changing these over to disc. Read finding a back wheel w/disc to fit might be tricky. I would be fine with front disc only. Thanks.
One more thing, recommend a grease to repack wheel bearings with.

[nfmisso]

Rims; my favorites are Velocity Dyad; they are round and flat, much better than any other rim I have used for a wheel build. 2nd choice is Sun CR18, 2/3 the price, 15% heavier.

Brake Pad: KoolStop Salmon

discs - not my style

Grease - boat trailer wheel bearing grease - cheap, lasts forever, water resistant; I use it for all the bearings on my bikes.

[Joe_W]

I guess the 700x34 refers to the tyres... I read that CX probably means cyclocross? (34mm rim width would be... excessive for that).
Regarding the "ground up" brake surface: how bad is it really? Is it likely to affect the structural integrity of the rim? Don't fix what ain't broke... but then you can always keep the set as spares (that is, unless you move to dic brakes).

Disc brakes: I guess the most cost effective solution is the Avid BB 7 (or maybe 5) Road. There are (of course) also other brands (Hayes, Shimano, Tektro) that produce disc brakes compatible to road levers. Stay away from last years Shimano CX disc brake (product recalled!) if someone tries to push it on you. The new one is ok. Best brake seems to be the TRP Hy/RD, but it is priced that way, too. Get really good cables and housing, brake performance critically depends on this! This is based on discussions I followed, not my own experience. I still ride the cheap Tektro, and it is... underwhelming. I might change to different discs and try if that helps.

Wheel set: There are a number of sets for 29ers out there, make sure you get one with the correct axle system! They are moving away from the normal quick release skewers...
Enjoy the ride!

[RiceBurner]

Thanks for replies.
Been using marine grease on my MTB's, just didn't want to admit it on here. Figured it was a cardinal sin, lol.

Yeah, probably ok. But a great excuse to upgrade. I'll definitely ride for a while first.

[Joe_W]

(01-15-2014, 09:14 PM)RiceBurner Wrote:  Yeah, probably ok. But a great excuse to upgrade. I'll definitely ride for a while first.

I can totally understand that...
I just got a second set of wheels for my CX, handbuilt with Novatec hubs and tubeless-ready BOR rims. Usually I build my own, but this time I would have paid much more just for the parts than the finished wheels... Currently I ride Schwalbe Marathon Winter on them, as they are wider than the stock rims, so I cannot really comment on how well they perform. They do look very nice though.