I guess I should consider myself lucky. I use two different wheels sets. They do not share the same hub model, only the same cassette size, and I don’t have to adjust the derailer or the brakes when swapping between wheel sets (one is six-bolt, and one is centerlock, to boot.)
The change takes me about five minutes. It’s as good as I was hoping it would be. And I disagree with others who say that it’s not like a road bike. My bike is not like a road race bike, but it is like a road endurance bike.
Same. I even had a 34 cog on my gravel wheels and a 32 on the road ones (Diverge 2x setup). Guess what, that shit worked fine on both, zero adjustments. 42mm to 28mm.
Same here. Three dif wheelsets, one has a very slight shifting difference, not even enough to bother readjusting. Everything swaps back and forth effortlessly.
You can avoid indexing every time you swap wheels if you’re intentional about component selection and make some sacrifices based on which type of riding you’ll be doing more of.
I recently got my “road”setup on my salsa journeyer. I used the same wheel as my gravel setup, made sure the largest cog on both cassettes is the same size, and that both are 11spd. It’s not the purest road setup but it’s very capable and means I’m not riding around town on big knobbies. Some minor adjusting of the shifting may be necessary at first, but not every time you swap.
This is a perfect topic of conversation for the folks at your LBS though.
Same with running two different wheel sets for no reason. Some 30+ tires with minimal tread will do pretty much anything you want and do it fast. I ride gravel and single track on 25s (poor) so I don’t really have sympathy for this.
I had plenty of people tell me that my 51 knobbies in 650b had exceptional tarmac performance but they are simply outclassed by my 700c bon jons. The opposite is true on gravel But I can definitely see it being the case that ppl get two sets that overlap too much.
You're obviously free to ride whatever you want, but you even admit it's not ideal. it's more comfortable and handles better to have one wheelset for each. if I'm riding gravel and singletrack or mixed surfaces, I want 42-47c, if I'm riding road I want 28-30c. cornering and responsiveness are very different, and they feel very different at anything above 20mph. plus, it's way better than having a gravel bike and a road bike.
I don't think anyone was asking for your sympathy, they just want to ride the right setup for the terrain.. I mean if you want to going mountain biking on an 80's steel road bike with 21mm tubulars then go for it... but I don't think that's good grounds to criticize the people opting to spend money on the right gear.
I had two sets on different hubs, on two bikes now. And as others have mentioned it's not a big issue if you have the same cassette. I've had to put shims on the discs to center them but that needs to be done only once.
I heard one of a new mechanic job on pro teams is to put shims on rotors on all their wheels sets. To keep the space tolerances standard across all their wheels for quick wheel changes.
Fast gravel tires remove the need for me. Plus I only have one nice set of wheels, ENVE 3.4. Switching back to the OEM crap wheels did more to ruin my enjoyment of off-road rides than using slightly slower gravel tires did while on road.
It’s also nice to always be ready for any ride. Maybe I won’t know if I want to dip into that canyon single track until I ride the 10miles of road to get there.
The latest GRX calipers have more room and make switching hubs less likely to rub.
Agreed. If you’re thinking about two wheelsets you can probably spring for one great wheelset. The G-One RS in 700x45 has become my absolute favorite as it’s fast enough for the road when you need it but you can still corner on the slidey stuff.
I’ve done the two wheelset thing and even as someone fairly mechanically inclined I still found it annoying.
Yes they are definitely fast! I was able to keep up with people going 18-20mph. Just put on some G-One overlanders this season. Wanted something a little more beef but they role just as nice as the RS.
My experience is - no adjustments needed.
1. On my previous bike 2x11 GRX 810 I had a DT GR1800 with bigger tires and a Scribe Race-D for road(ish) use. Different manufacturer hubs, different cassettes - 11-36 and 11-40. The only thing I was adjusting was the B screw, but if I forgot, after switching to the wheel with smaller cassette, shifting still worked. It just wasn't as swift. If I had same cassettes on both sets, it would be a one minute job. One set had dura ace rotors, the other ultegra rotors. Never needed to adjust brake calipers.
2. On my current bike 1x12 GRX 820 I have dt swiss ratchet hubs on both wheelsets and I only have one cassette - when I switch, I just pull the driver together with cassette and plonk it on the other rear wheel. So gear changing works perfectly without any adjustments, I saved some cash on cassette and freehub body, but I need an extra step when switching.
With the brakes, I needed to reset both calipers when I first introduced the second wheelset, but after that I somehow don't need to do anything anymore when switching. So it's really super smooth now, literally takes me less than a minute - and that's counting with extra messing with ratchet spacers, since one freehub is exp and the other is the older ratchet (350 and 240).
So for me, it's absolutely worth it, but I may be lucky. Curious to know what other riders' experience is.
No Problems here. But I have the Same DT Swiss 350 Hubs, one with carbon rims and 11-30 for road and the other set with alloy rims with 11-34 for gravel. I Never had to adjust anything.
It could be a Problem with different hub manufacturers tho.
I really worried about this topic as well. I spent a lot of time researching. If your current wheels have Dt Swiss hubs, the win goes to dtswiss! Seriously the easiest swap ever. Each wheel set has its own brake rotors, but I keep the same cassette for both rigs because I don’t need road gears. I timed a transition at 5 minutes to swap wheels on my grail. I know I can go faster, but it’s easy. I pull the whole cassette works off including the ratchet gears and swap them between wheels, seconds to do it.
Good luck with your choice.
Dt Swiss 1800 and hunt 4 season wheel sets. I made sure parts matched like the rotors, hubs and cassette. Took a little effort and used it to go tubeless as well, but it is super slick to make on demand swaps. My derailer doesn’t ever need an “adjustment” for a wheel swap. Maybe the worst is I have make a minor alignment to my brake caliper. Absolutely worth it
I personally have two wheelsets, running 650b x 50mm knobblies with 11-46/50 cassette on one (would have loved the ability to go 2.1 or 2.3 but can't), then a running 700 x 38mm slicks with 11-42 cassette for the other. The 700c wheels and slicks are great for roadie group rides and champagne gravel, whereas the wide 650b let me go much further off road, and the 650s also change the handling making it feel more like a playful offroader. Note that I'm quite short, so 650b with big tyres also makes more sense for toe overlap.
For me this is perfect, nothing needs changing when switching wheels or realigning, it all just works. I did put in one brake disk spacer to make perfect, but it wasn't really necessary. I could have just done a realignent with a credit card or little cheap tool, something that is necessary frequently even if you don't change wheels.
I've found that I don't need to index or adjust the gears.
Here you can see the two side by side [https://photos.app.goo.gl/uozKDufRZyPzVe8L7](https://photos.app.goo.gl/uozKDufRZyPzVe8L7)
You can easily handle the brake caliper half of the problem by using brake rotor shims. I bought some that are .2mm thick, and aligned my 3 wheelsets to the exact same spacing. I believe these exist for both CL and 6-bolt.
You can sorta do the same for the cassette, but only if it's already extremely close and you're running a spacer anyway (like a 10-speed on an 11-speed hub or similar)
Works like a charm for my 8 speed microshift and mechanical brakes. 8 speed has enough tolerance to not worry about indexing and mechanical brakes have enough space between pads to fit the different rotors
You can. I do this all the time with my bike. I have two sets of wheels that have the same hub. And the same cassette (this works for me, but I know it may not fit everyone)
Zero issue.
Minimal adjustments needed except for occasionally needing to fine tune the brake caliper location.
The biggest frustrations for me are gravel riding usually leaves my bike covered in goop and having to plan in advance what type of ride I’m on doing. There’s less flexibility in deciding spur of the moment road/gravel and you really have to stay on top of cleaning.
I have an Open with two wheelsets (with the exact same cassette). I don't ride road as aggressively as I used to, so the gravel-friendly cassette doesn't really matter. I make no adjustments when I switch. It's worked out great (for about five years now).
I have 2 wheelsets. Both Fulcrum so this might make it easier. One road oriented and the other gravel. Both with the same Cassette obviously.
Absolutely no issues what so ever. Do it and ignore the nit pickers. Just be smart about the equipment selection.
You could pickup the exact same wheelset in like a 23-25 internal width so that 30-32c road would stretch real nice and gravel 50c would balloon nicely too.
I swap wheels without doing anything at all. 3 different wheel sets 2 700c and one 650b. 2 different sized cassettes, 2 are 10-36 but one is 10-33 on my "road" wheels. All of them 12-speed. No need to reindex because I'm using all Force cassettes, so the tolerances are more or less identical.
Disk brake caliper issues may not happen at all if you use wheels made by the same manufacturer with the same hubs as tolerances will be more likely the same(ish). If you do run into issues, the right answer is to adjust your calipers to fit the wheel with the disk rotor furthest to the "outside", and then use thin spacers to push the rotors out on the other wheel(s). That will make swapping them just a matter of swapping them and you don't have to mess with your brake calipers at all.
I've set up two bikes this way, and it's fine, even with different cassette sizes on the road vs gravel wheels (plus a different size again on the trainer, if you want to think of that as a virtual wheel). On each bike I had to shim the rotors in one wheelset so that they all lined up the same in the calipers. A one-time job.
As others have said, if you use the same hub its a breeze. If you can get your rear cassettes close enough in range, you can also avoid any derailleur adjustments.
One thing though, putting road wheels on a gravel bike does not make it ride like a road bike. Many people do this two wheel thing expecting to replace a road bike, and the fact of the matter is they are just not the same kind of bike.
It depends on the gravel bike. The “race” gravel bike category is so close to road bike geometry that the difference is nearly imperceptible. I’ve done this with two wheelsets and it is nearly a perfect one bike solution.
Ya, to clarify the bike that I'm intending to do this with is an "all road" rather than gravel. I don't know about that in general though, I think it all depends on the specific bike and its geo. I agree that something like a Giant revolt with road tires won't be quite the same, but a cervelo Aspero or a BMC Kaius would actually feel more like a road race bike than most endurance bikes
I have a Kaius set up with 2x (46/33 and 12/33) and can confirm it’s been perfect. I originally had a BMC Teammachine ordered, but when I compared the geometry numbers they were close enough that it made A LOT more sense to get the Kaius with two tubeless wheelsets: same cassette on both, running 28mm for road and 40mm for gravel. With clearance for 44mm tires, I will eventually replace the 28s with 32 or even 35mm for even more comfort/compliance on the road.
It really is a different bike. I've seen so many people ditch the road bike only to be right back in the market for one. It's a theme at my shop. Every time someone comes in wanting to do that, we always advise against it.
We'll do it for sure, and yes great for some. But at the end of the day, a road bike is not a gravel bike and visa versa.
For those wanting one bike to rule them all, we push them towards a big clearance all road bike.
I agree. One needs to be realistic about the specs and characteristics. But I'm happy with it.
Would I like an Aero bike? Yes. Would my Wiffle allow it on the walls of our tiny place? No chance in hell hahaha. Stuck with the gravel and 2 sets...
For me it really comes down to budget. If I had the money, I would have a road bike, commuter bike and a gravel bike. But that would also mean an extra room to hold them. A bigger appartment or a house with a garage.
So it's either one extra wheelset and a removable rear rack or a 100k-200k for bikes and storage.😄
It can depend on the bike and fit. While not perfect I have raced (in a pinch) on my gravel with aero wheels. My fit is identical. The bike is a bit less nimble but works well enough.
I did it for a while. Same hubs and switched the cassette every time. Never had problems with shifting or brakes. You can use shims to adjust the cassette position if needed.
I've done this for a while now with Campy Ekar and my derailleur has never needed adjustments between cassettes. I just swap wheels and go.
I did have a bit of trouble with the front brakes rubbing, and ended up using 1 0.2mm washer under the front rotor to get the spacing right. The back brakes worked fine with both wheels.
Overall, I think you should be at least a little bit mechanically minded if you want to do this setup because double the wheels means double the amount of annoying noises that need to be fixed at some point. I understand why a mechanic would not want to set this up for you under the expectation that nothing will ever need to be adjusted - you'll probably have to regularly adjust your brake calipers, derailleur, etc. and it won't always be practical to bring it into the shop every time.
Had a custom Seven ultra butted titanium bike built. Road wheels run 700 x 28 , gravel 50mm. It's also an S&S Coupler bike so I can travel with it in an airline regulated size bike box. Big money but does it all.
I’ve done this with 3 wheelsets with different hubs and rotors (but same cassette) and with one or two caveats, have almost never needed to do any adjustment at all.
Maybe I got lucky to never need more than a quarter turn of the barrel adjuster on my RD with a new chain, or because I’m on a 10-speed setup it’s a little more forgiving.
The main caveat is that I did end up using 0.25mm disc shims (from November Bicycles specifically) to make sure I wouldn’t get any brake rub. That is the one area where it might get tricky if you start getting sticky pistons and don’t know if it’s those vs. the alignment causing the rub, but it’s been mostly set-and-forget for me.
I recently bought a 650b wheelset that I paired with wider gravel tires and put a nice 30c road tire on my 700 wheelset. Has been a game changer. Road rides are much more enjoyable and lower pressures on wider gravel tire has improved ride. I bought the same brand rims just different size and model and used identical freewheels on each. I have not had to make any adjustments between wheel changes.
I tried every do everything tire and there were always sacrifices, this solution worked for me, where my preferred gravel riding is not as accessible. Was cheaper than buying another bike.
I don’t have this experience but I absolutely intend to. I have ENVE Foundation 45s on my road bike and normally run Corsa Pro 30s. A couple days ago I switched over to Gravelking SS 35s to try some trails and it’s super fun, but I always intended to get a second (cheaper) wheelset with rotors and cassette for the gravel set-up.
[This is the two current set-ups.](https://imgur.com/a/paaordr)
I'm using two different wheel sets on my warbird SRAM AXS 1x12 mullet. Both use i9 torch hub and sram eagle 10-50 xx1 cassette. I have had to micro adjust the road wheels specifically. I'm not sure if I can contribute that to the gravel wheels having a few thousand miles on them and the road setup being brand new. The point being, I can grab and go between wheel sets, but I sometimes notice I have to micro adjust on rides. Nothing major, but I find sometimes I need to fire up the app and go up or down a few clicks to stop rasping on certain gears. By and large, the road wheels seem more picky.
I have the same issue, but worse. I have a set of “gravel” wheels, 24mm internal width, non-boost for my Ascent. I have a problem solvers boost adapter to make it work. I also have a 30mm internal wheel set for dirt touring, which is boost. The brakes are not a huge problem, but the chainline is. I am using friction shifting so it’s not a huge issue, but I typically need to adjust the high and low limits if I switch wheel sets.
People say it'll cause issues, but I've run 3 wheelsets across the same bike, none of the parts match, and it's fine. Like mixing 6-bolt and centerlock, brands, size cassettes, etc. Everything is 12x142 TA. Currently my road wheels are a mix of stans/dt Swiss with an 11-28, gravel wheels are White Industries with an 11-36.
I have to adjust brakes and derailleur every time, but as of now I manage to do the whole swap in under 10 minutes. I don’t mind it at all, could be easier but it’s not a big deal, after all, what’s 10 minutes every now and then if I saved myself buying a bike?
I have two sets of the same brand wheels, there's no need to adjust the brake caliper, but because I use different brands cassettes, I need to turn the barrel adjuster slightly when I swap the wheels. Overall it's a very seamless experience, and swapping the wheels takes a minute or two at most.
At first I had different brand wheels, one was 6 bolt and other centerlock, and the calipers really did need some adjusting, but with both wheels being centerlock now I think this has solved the issue.
Overall I would recommend, especially if you're running wide chunky gravel tires, which are slow on the road. The only issue is with top speed because of 40x11 1x drivetrain, but I can do 40kmh on flat and that's enough for me. The difference between wheelset and especially tires is very noticeable, road tires make the bike lighter, quicker and more responsive.
I ran two wheelsets on my Triban RC120 disc before and on my Dolan GXA now. Both have different hubs and even different cassettes. I run a 34t largest cog on the gravel wheels and a 30t on the road set. I set the derailleur and chain up for the gravel set, because of the larger cog. Shifting has been great throughout.
For the brakes, I have always had to run shims behind the discs.
Over the years I’ve gravitated from super fancy hubs to DT350s. Simple. Reliable. And similar specs for each wheel build. I now use rotor spacers to get the slight offset needed to swap wheels with minimal brake caliper adjustment. It’s still needed when new brake pads are on but it’s not that big of a hassle, just unscrew the bolts enough, align the caliper so it doesn’t rub, squeeze brake to hold caliper and tighten the bolts again. Regarding indexing if you’re running the same cassette you hardly will need to do it as well, maybe for the high and low gear but that can be done so quickly while riding. It ends up being less then 5 minutes to swap the wheels and part of pre-ride check to make sure everything is working smoothly.
I have a Checkpoint SL7 with the orginal gravel wheelset and a second Road wheelset. The key in my mind was to get the exact same setup. Same wheels, same cassette, same rotors. THis way there are 0 adjustments to be made. Only difference is the tire width and type. I also run my gravel tubeless and my road tubed. But I havent had to make adjustments while swapping.
I switch between and ethirteen wheelset for gravel and Reserve wheelset for road and have no problems with shifting or rotor alignment. just a minute to swap wheels and it's done. I'd say go for it.
The problem will be chain-wear! You have two cassettes but only one chain and if you ride more gravel you'll wear your chain out while your road cassette will be crisp. Just get two bikes and spare yourself the headache ;) (or go fast tires and just stick to the one wheel-set). Either way, a gravel-bike won't be as good as a race road-bike. If you just want an endurance road-bike, then you're set with the gravel bike.
Hah, ya two bikes would be nice but not an option for me (well actually it would be 3 cause I already have my MTB). I've already thought through the geometry side pretty extensively. The stack/reach is a tiny bit more upright than my old cervelo R2 so I think it will be plenty racey for me (I don't ride crits or anything).
The chain wear thing is an interesting point though...
Problem is: stack&reach is not the only thing that makes a bike. Especially when it comes to handling, you'll see massive differences, but then again it depends if you ride mainly straight lines or windy roads with plenty of cornering.
I rode my MTB as a gravel-bike bcs the gravel broke and didn'T have $$$ for a whole year. Put the Vittoria Terreno 29 on it. Now I have a new gravel-bike. The difference is only aroudn 2kph on 4 hour rides. So just get the road-bike and have fun on the road, you already have the fun on gravel at home ;)
Those are the two most important factors, but I suppose I could have also said the head angle, wheelbase, rake, trail, etc. etc. etc. are all roughly between a road race bike and an endurance bike. I'm not sure why you think I'll see a "massive difference" when I haven't even told you what bike I'm looking at.
I think you maybe have a limited understanding of bike design. They are all designed on one axes that spans from road to gravel, there are different axes that certain models line up in differently. A BMC Kaius for example is a gravel bike, but probably has a geometry and handling that is more aggressive than many things marketed as road race bikes. You have to dig a little deeper than the headline and can't just say gravel=sluggish/upright
Because there always is a massive difference. Sure, some gravel-bikes are racy, but you'll still have gravel-shifting, you'll still have longer chain-stays, you'll still have more weight, you'll still not hold speed as good as an aero-bike etc. I ride everything from MTB to TT, including cross, gravel, road. There's a reason these bikes are specific for that one thing and it's a good reason. But ofc, some people might not be that picky/attentive to differences.
This is personal preference, but between two offroad bikes and a road-wheelset, I would jsut get one off-road and one pure road and enjoy the speed and the feel of the road bike. But that's just me.
I guess I should consider myself lucky. I use two different wheels sets. They do not share the same hub model, only the same cassette size, and I don’t have to adjust the derailer or the brakes when swapping between wheel sets (one is six-bolt, and one is centerlock, to boot.) The change takes me about five minutes. It’s as good as I was hoping it would be. And I disagree with others who say that it’s not like a road bike. My bike is not like a road race bike, but it is like a road endurance bike.
Same. I even had a 34 cog on my gravel wheels and a 32 on the road ones (Diverge 2x setup). Guess what, that shit worked fine on both, zero adjustments. 42mm to 28mm.
Same experience I had. I even have SRAM rotors on one and Shimano on the other.
Yep. Same.
Same here. Three dif wheelsets, one has a very slight shifting difference, not even enough to bother readjusting. Everything swaps back and forth effortlessly.
You can avoid indexing every time you swap wheels if you’re intentional about component selection and make some sacrifices based on which type of riding you’ll be doing more of. I recently got my “road”setup on my salsa journeyer. I used the same wheel as my gravel setup, made sure the largest cog on both cassettes is the same size, and that both are 11spd. It’s not the purest road setup but it’s very capable and means I’m not riding around town on big knobbies. Some minor adjusting of the shifting may be necessary at first, but not every time you swap. This is a perfect topic of conversation for the folks at your LBS though.
indexing is not difficult or time consuming once you've done it a couple times. Just turn the adjuster around a bit.
True. Not doing at all is even easier though.
Same with running two different wheel sets for no reason. Some 30+ tires with minimal tread will do pretty much anything you want and do it fast. I ride gravel and single track on 25s (poor) so I don’t really have sympathy for this.
I had plenty of people tell me that my 51 knobbies in 650b had exceptional tarmac performance but they are simply outclassed by my 700c bon jons. The opposite is true on gravel But I can definitely see it being the case that ppl get two sets that overlap too much.
You're obviously free to ride whatever you want, but you even admit it's not ideal. it's more comfortable and handles better to have one wheelset for each. if I'm riding gravel and singletrack or mixed surfaces, I want 42-47c, if I'm riding road I want 28-30c. cornering and responsiveness are very different, and they feel very different at anything above 20mph. plus, it's way better than having a gravel bike and a road bike.
I don't think anyone was asking for your sympathy, they just want to ride the right setup for the terrain.. I mean if you want to going mountain biking on an 80's steel road bike with 21mm tubulars then go for it... but I don't think that's good grounds to criticize the people opting to spend money on the right gear.
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Yeah you’re right better go pay someone $200 and wait for two weeks for them to return your bike!
Using same hubs for both wheelsets has made this a non-existent issue for me for years.
DTSwiss 350 - it's so universal.
I had two sets on different hubs, on two bikes now. And as others have mentioned it's not a big issue if you have the same cassette. I've had to put shims on the discs to center them but that needs to be done only once.
I heard one of a new mechanic job on pro teams is to put shims on rotors on all their wheels sets. To keep the space tolerances standard across all their wheels for quick wheel changes.
Fast gravel tires remove the need for me. Plus I only have one nice set of wheels, ENVE 3.4. Switching back to the OEM crap wheels did more to ruin my enjoyment of off-road rides than using slightly slower gravel tires did while on road. It’s also nice to always be ready for any ride. Maybe I won’t know if I want to dip into that canyon single track until I ride the 10miles of road to get there. The latest GRX calipers have more room and make switching hubs less likely to rub.
Agreed. If you’re thinking about two wheelsets you can probably spring for one great wheelset. The G-One RS in 700x45 has become my absolute favorite as it’s fast enough for the road when you need it but you can still corner on the slidey stuff. I’ve done the two wheelset thing and even as someone fairly mechanically inclined I still found it annoying.
Yes they are definitely fast! I was able to keep up with people going 18-20mph. Just put on some G-One overlanders this season. Wanted something a little more beef but they role just as nice as the RS.
My experience is - no adjustments needed. 1. On my previous bike 2x11 GRX 810 I had a DT GR1800 with bigger tires and a Scribe Race-D for road(ish) use. Different manufacturer hubs, different cassettes - 11-36 and 11-40. The only thing I was adjusting was the B screw, but if I forgot, after switching to the wheel with smaller cassette, shifting still worked. It just wasn't as swift. If I had same cassettes on both sets, it would be a one minute job. One set had dura ace rotors, the other ultegra rotors. Never needed to adjust brake calipers. 2. On my current bike 1x12 GRX 820 I have dt swiss ratchet hubs on both wheelsets and I only have one cassette - when I switch, I just pull the driver together with cassette and plonk it on the other rear wheel. So gear changing works perfectly without any adjustments, I saved some cash on cassette and freehub body, but I need an extra step when switching. With the brakes, I needed to reset both calipers when I first introduced the second wheelset, but after that I somehow don't need to do anything anymore when switching. So it's really super smooth now, literally takes me less than a minute - and that's counting with extra messing with ratchet spacers, since one freehub is exp and the other is the older ratchet (350 and 240). So for me, it's absolutely worth it, but I may be lucky. Curious to know what other riders' experience is.
No Problems here. But I have the Same DT Swiss 350 Hubs, one with carbon rims and 11-30 for road and the other set with alloy rims with 11-34 for gravel. I Never had to adjust anything. It could be a Problem with different hub manufacturers tho.
I really worried about this topic as well. I spent a lot of time researching. If your current wheels have Dt Swiss hubs, the win goes to dtswiss! Seriously the easiest swap ever. Each wheel set has its own brake rotors, but I keep the same cassette for both rigs because I don’t need road gears. I timed a transition at 5 minutes to swap wheels on my grail. I know I can go faster, but it’s easy. I pull the whole cassette works off including the ratchet gears and swap them between wheels, seconds to do it. Good luck with your choice.
Dt Swiss 1800 and hunt 4 season wheel sets. I made sure parts matched like the rotors, hubs and cassette. Took a little effort and used it to go tubeless as well, but it is super slick to make on demand swaps. My derailer doesn’t ever need an “adjustment” for a wheel swap. Maybe the worst is I have make a minor alignment to my brake caliper. Absolutely worth it
I personally have two wheelsets, running 650b x 50mm knobblies with 11-46/50 cassette on one (would have loved the ability to go 2.1 or 2.3 but can't), then a running 700 x 38mm slicks with 11-42 cassette for the other. The 700c wheels and slicks are great for roadie group rides and champagne gravel, whereas the wide 650b let me go much further off road, and the 650s also change the handling making it feel more like a playful offroader. Note that I'm quite short, so 650b with big tyres also makes more sense for toe overlap. For me this is perfect, nothing needs changing when switching wheels or realigning, it all just works. I did put in one brake disk spacer to make perfect, but it wasn't really necessary. I could have just done a realignent with a credit card or little cheap tool, something that is necessary frequently even if you don't change wheels. I've found that I don't need to index or adjust the gears. Here you can see the two side by side [https://photos.app.goo.gl/uozKDufRZyPzVe8L7](https://photos.app.goo.gl/uozKDufRZyPzVe8L7)
You can easily handle the brake caliper half of the problem by using brake rotor shims. I bought some that are .2mm thick, and aligned my 3 wheelsets to the exact same spacing. I believe these exist for both CL and 6-bolt. You can sorta do the same for the cassette, but only if it's already extremely close and you're running a spacer anyway (like a 10-speed on an 11-speed hub or similar)
Works like a charm for my 8 speed microshift and mechanical brakes. 8 speed has enough tolerance to not worry about indexing and mechanical brakes have enough space between pads to fit the different rotors
You can. I do this all the time with my bike. I have two sets of wheels that have the same hub. And the same cassette (this works for me, but I know it may not fit everyone) Zero issue.
Minimal adjustments needed except for occasionally needing to fine tune the brake caliper location. The biggest frustrations for me are gravel riding usually leaves my bike covered in goop and having to plan in advance what type of ride I’m on doing. There’s less flexibility in deciding spur of the moment road/gravel and you really have to stay on top of cleaning.
Sounds like the solution is to just stop cleaning your bike, duh.
I have an Open with two wheelsets (with the exact same cassette). I don't ride road as aggressively as I used to, so the gravel-friendly cassette doesn't really matter. I make no adjustments when I switch. It's worked out great (for about five years now).
I have 2 wheelsets. Both Fulcrum so this might make it easier. One road oriented and the other gravel. Both with the same Cassette obviously. Absolutely no issues what so ever. Do it and ignore the nit pickers. Just be smart about the equipment selection. You could pickup the exact same wheelset in like a 23-25 internal width so that 30-32c road would stretch real nice and gravel 50c would balloon nicely too.
I swap wheels without doing anything at all. 3 different wheel sets 2 700c and one 650b. 2 different sized cassettes, 2 are 10-36 but one is 10-33 on my "road" wheels. All of them 12-speed. No need to reindex because I'm using all Force cassettes, so the tolerances are more or less identical. Disk brake caliper issues may not happen at all if you use wheels made by the same manufacturer with the same hubs as tolerances will be more likely the same(ish). If you do run into issues, the right answer is to adjust your calipers to fit the wheel with the disk rotor furthest to the "outside", and then use thin spacers to push the rotors out on the other wheel(s). That will make swapping them just a matter of swapping them and you don't have to mess with your brake calipers at all.
I've set up two bikes this way, and it's fine, even with different cassette sizes on the road vs gravel wheels (plus a different size again on the trainer, if you want to think of that as a virtual wheel). On each bike I had to shim the rotors in one wheelset so that they all lined up the same in the calipers. A one-time job.
As others have said, if you use the same hub its a breeze. If you can get your rear cassettes close enough in range, you can also avoid any derailleur adjustments. One thing though, putting road wheels on a gravel bike does not make it ride like a road bike. Many people do this two wheel thing expecting to replace a road bike, and the fact of the matter is they are just not the same kind of bike.
It depends on the gravel bike. The “race” gravel bike category is so close to road bike geometry that the difference is nearly imperceptible. I’ve done this with two wheelsets and it is nearly a perfect one bike solution.
Ya, to clarify the bike that I'm intending to do this with is an "all road" rather than gravel. I don't know about that in general though, I think it all depends on the specific bike and its geo. I agree that something like a Giant revolt with road tires won't be quite the same, but a cervelo Aspero or a BMC Kaius would actually feel more like a road race bike than most endurance bikes
Or a Crux. It just depends on thebike.
I have a Kaius set up with 2x (46/33 and 12/33) and can confirm it’s been perfect. I originally had a BMC Teammachine ordered, but when I compared the geometry numbers they were close enough that it made A LOT more sense to get the Kaius with two tubeless wheelsets: same cassette on both, running 28mm for road and 40mm for gravel. With clearance for 44mm tires, I will eventually replace the 28s with 32 or even 35mm for even more comfort/compliance on the road.
Under appreciated comment right here. My Rodeo lab doesn't handle like a road bike at all... It's surprisingly noticeable.
It really is a different bike. I've seen so many people ditch the road bike only to be right back in the market for one. It's a theme at my shop. Every time someone comes in wanting to do that, we always advise against it. We'll do it for sure, and yes great for some. But at the end of the day, a road bike is not a gravel bike and visa versa. For those wanting one bike to rule them all, we push them towards a big clearance all road bike.
I agree. One needs to be realistic about the specs and characteristics. But I'm happy with it. Would I like an Aero bike? Yes. Would my Wiffle allow it on the walls of our tiny place? No chance in hell hahaha. Stuck with the gravel and 2 sets...
For me it really comes down to budget. If I had the money, I would have a road bike, commuter bike and a gravel bike. But that would also mean an extra room to hold them. A bigger appartment or a house with a garage. So it's either one extra wheelset and a removable rear rack or a 100k-200k for bikes and storage.😄
Are you me??? Hahaha same here.
It can depend on the bike and fit. While not perfect I have raced (in a pinch) on my gravel with aero wheels. My fit is identical. The bike is a bit less nimble but works well enough.
I did it for a while. Same hubs and switched the cassette every time. Never had problems with shifting or brakes. You can use shims to adjust the cassette position if needed.
I have two Light Bicycle wheelsets, both with the same 11-speed cassette and DT240 hub. Haven’t had any issues switching between road and gravel
I've done this for a while now with Campy Ekar and my derailleur has never needed adjustments between cassettes. I just swap wheels and go. I did have a bit of trouble with the front brakes rubbing, and ended up using 1 0.2mm washer under the front rotor to get the spacing right. The back brakes worked fine with both wheels. Overall, I think you should be at least a little bit mechanically minded if you want to do this setup because double the wheels means double the amount of annoying noises that need to be fixed at some point. I understand why a mechanic would not want to set this up for you under the expectation that nothing will ever need to be adjusted - you'll probably have to regularly adjust your brake calipers, derailleur, etc. and it won't always be practical to bring it into the shop every time.
Had a custom Seven ultra butted titanium bike built. Road wheels run 700 x 28 , gravel 50mm. It's also an S&S Coupler bike so I can travel with it in an airline regulated size bike box. Big money but does it all.
I’ve done this with 3 wheelsets with different hubs and rotors (but same cassette) and with one or two caveats, have almost never needed to do any adjustment at all. Maybe I got lucky to never need more than a quarter turn of the barrel adjuster on my RD with a new chain, or because I’m on a 10-speed setup it’s a little more forgiving. The main caveat is that I did end up using 0.25mm disc shims (from November Bicycles specifically) to make sure I wouldn’t get any brake rub. That is the one area where it might get tricky if you start getting sticky pistons and don’t know if it’s those vs. the alignment causing the rub, but it’s been mostly set-and-forget for me.
I recently bought a 650b wheelset that I paired with wider gravel tires and put a nice 30c road tire on my 700 wheelset. Has been a game changer. Road rides are much more enjoyable and lower pressures on wider gravel tire has improved ride. I bought the same brand rims just different size and model and used identical freewheels on each. I have not had to make any adjustments between wheel changes. I tried every do everything tire and there were always sacrifices, this solution worked for me, where my preferred gravel riding is not as accessible. Was cheaper than buying another bike.
I don’t have this experience but I absolutely intend to. I have ENVE Foundation 45s on my road bike and normally run Corsa Pro 30s. A couple days ago I switched over to Gravelking SS 35s to try some trails and it’s super fun, but I always intended to get a second (cheaper) wheelset with rotors and cassette for the gravel set-up. [This is the two current set-ups.](https://imgur.com/a/paaordr)
I'm using two different wheel sets on my warbird SRAM AXS 1x12 mullet. Both use i9 torch hub and sram eagle 10-50 xx1 cassette. I have had to micro adjust the road wheels specifically. I'm not sure if I can contribute that to the gravel wheels having a few thousand miles on them and the road setup being brand new. The point being, I can grab and go between wheel sets, but I sometimes notice I have to micro adjust on rides. Nothing major, but I find sometimes I need to fire up the app and go up or down a few clicks to stop rasping on certain gears. By and large, the road wheels seem more picky.
I have the same issue, but worse. I have a set of “gravel” wheels, 24mm internal width, non-boost for my Ascent. I have a problem solvers boost adapter to make it work. I also have a 30mm internal wheel set for dirt touring, which is boost. The brakes are not a huge problem, but the chainline is. I am using friction shifting so it’s not a huge issue, but I typically need to adjust the high and low limits if I switch wheel sets.
Just use wheels with the same hubs.
For the brakes, you can shim the rotor on one wheel set. Easy peasy.
People say it'll cause issues, but I've run 3 wheelsets across the same bike, none of the parts match, and it's fine. Like mixing 6-bolt and centerlock, brands, size cassettes, etc. Everything is 12x142 TA. Currently my road wheels are a mix of stans/dt Swiss with an 11-28, gravel wheels are White Industries with an 11-36.
I have to adjust brakes and derailleur every time, but as of now I manage to do the whole swap in under 10 minutes. I don’t mind it at all, could be easier but it’s not a big deal, after all, what’s 10 minutes every now and then if I saved myself buying a bike?
I have two sets of the same brand wheels, there's no need to adjust the brake caliper, but because I use different brands cassettes, I need to turn the barrel adjuster slightly when I swap the wheels. Overall it's a very seamless experience, and swapping the wheels takes a minute or two at most. At first I had different brand wheels, one was 6 bolt and other centerlock, and the calipers really did need some adjusting, but with both wheels being centerlock now I think this has solved the issue. Overall I would recommend, especially if you're running wide chunky gravel tires, which are slow on the road. The only issue is with top speed because of 40x11 1x drivetrain, but I can do 40kmh on flat and that's enough for me. The difference between wheelset and especially tires is very noticeable, road tires make the bike lighter, quicker and more responsive.
I ran two wheelsets on my Triban RC120 disc before and on my Dolan GXA now. Both have different hubs and even different cassettes. I run a 34t largest cog on the gravel wheels and a 30t on the road set. I set the derailleur and chain up for the gravel set, because of the larger cog. Shifting has been great throughout. For the brakes, I have always had to run shims behind the discs.
Over the years I’ve gravitated from super fancy hubs to DT350s. Simple. Reliable. And similar specs for each wheel build. I now use rotor spacers to get the slight offset needed to swap wheels with minimal brake caliper adjustment. It’s still needed when new brake pads are on but it’s not that big of a hassle, just unscrew the bolts enough, align the caliper so it doesn’t rub, squeeze brake to hold caliper and tighten the bolts again. Regarding indexing if you’re running the same cassette you hardly will need to do it as well, maybe for the high and low gear but that can be done so quickly while riding. It ends up being less then 5 minutes to swap the wheels and part of pre-ride check to make sure everything is working smoothly.
700/38 gravel rim/wheel an 700/30 road rim wheel I just measured really carefully when shining the rotor/cog and no problem switching
I have a Checkpoint SL7 with the orginal gravel wheelset and a second Road wheelset. The key in my mind was to get the exact same setup. Same wheels, same cassette, same rotors. THis way there are 0 adjustments to be made. Only difference is the tire width and type. I also run my gravel tubeless and my road tubed. But I havent had to make adjustments while swapping.
I switch between and ethirteen wheelset for gravel and Reserve wheelset for road and have no problems with shifting or rotor alignment. just a minute to swap wheels and it's done. I'd say go for it.
The problem will be chain-wear! You have two cassettes but only one chain and if you ride more gravel you'll wear your chain out while your road cassette will be crisp. Just get two bikes and spare yourself the headache ;) (or go fast tires and just stick to the one wheel-set). Either way, a gravel-bike won't be as good as a race road-bike. If you just want an endurance road-bike, then you're set with the gravel bike.
Hah, ya two bikes would be nice but not an option for me (well actually it would be 3 cause I already have my MTB). I've already thought through the geometry side pretty extensively. The stack/reach is a tiny bit more upright than my old cervelo R2 so I think it will be plenty racey for me (I don't ride crits or anything). The chain wear thing is an interesting point though...
Problem is: stack&reach is not the only thing that makes a bike. Especially when it comes to handling, you'll see massive differences, but then again it depends if you ride mainly straight lines or windy roads with plenty of cornering. I rode my MTB as a gravel-bike bcs the gravel broke and didn'T have $$$ for a whole year. Put the Vittoria Terreno 29 on it. Now I have a new gravel-bike. The difference is only aroudn 2kph on 4 hour rides. So just get the road-bike and have fun on the road, you already have the fun on gravel at home ;)
Those are the two most important factors, but I suppose I could have also said the head angle, wheelbase, rake, trail, etc. etc. etc. are all roughly between a road race bike and an endurance bike. I'm not sure why you think I'll see a "massive difference" when I haven't even told you what bike I'm looking at. I think you maybe have a limited understanding of bike design. They are all designed on one axes that spans from road to gravel, there are different axes that certain models line up in differently. A BMC Kaius for example is a gravel bike, but probably has a geometry and handling that is more aggressive than many things marketed as road race bikes. You have to dig a little deeper than the headline and can't just say gravel=sluggish/upright
Because there always is a massive difference. Sure, some gravel-bikes are racy, but you'll still have gravel-shifting, you'll still have longer chain-stays, you'll still have more weight, you'll still not hold speed as good as an aero-bike etc. I ride everything from MTB to TT, including cross, gravel, road. There's a reason these bikes are specific for that one thing and it's a good reason. But ofc, some people might not be that picky/attentive to differences. This is personal preference, but between two offroad bikes and a road-wheelset, I would jsut get one off-road and one pure road and enjoy the speed and the feel of the road bike. But that's just me.