Manufacture them in Asia and pass on the savings. It’s not a structural part, so who cares where it’s made.
I never use screws. I always use tape. I always get waves, no matter how careful I am. Been using wheel covers since you were probably about seven. 
I too am interested in this product. Do you have plans to ship to Canada? Thanks.
Michael
The waviness comes from attaching them with screws. When you only attach the covers at eight points around the perimeter then it’s difficult to avoid this. That’s why we recommend using electrical tape to attach them (and we’ll include a roll with each order). It takes a little more time, but it’s well worth it.
There is another source of waviness that comes from the dish of the disc not being precisely matched to the wheel. You can get away with a little extra clearance on the NDS, but not the DS. And when you make it fit at the hub and rim edge it distorts.
Do you account for this, and if so, how? Ideally you’d want to customize each one for the hub and rim being used… which you could do easily enough if you made flat sheets and trimmed them… like people are doing with plastic.
The waviness comes from attaching them with screws. When you only attach the covers at eight points around the perimeter then it’s difficult to avoid this. That’s why we recommend using electrical tape to attach them (and we’ll include a roll with each order). It takes a little more time, but it’s well worth it.
There is another source of waviness that comes from the dish of the disc not being precisely matched to the wheel. You can get away with a little extra clearance on the NDS, but not the DS. And when you make it fit at the hub and rim edge it distorts.
Do you account for this, and if so, how? Ideally you’d want to customize each one for the hub and rim being used… which you could do easily enough if you made flat sheets and trimmed them… like people are doing with plastic.
Right. Dish is crucial to a proper fit so as soon as we can afford it we will cut a few new sets of molds with slightly different dishes so we can achieve a perfect fit for all wheels. Even with just one dish, though, we should be able to achieve a good fit on a wide variety of wheels by adjusting the diameter we cut them at. For something like a Zipp 808 we should be able to cut the covers to where they sit on the rim fairly close to the inside edge whereas for a narrower deep V shape we will have to cut them to a wider diameter so they sit on the rim closer to the brake track.
Just FYI, an option for waveless plastic is DYMA wheelcovers. I prefer them to Wheelbuilder.
You’re late to the party
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Just FYI, an option for waveless plastic is DYMA wheelcovers. I prefer them to Wheelbuilder.
DYMA is awesome. Also has some of the best customer service.
I would be nervous to attached a wheel cover with electric tape, especially if it rain.
No issues ever attaching with tape and I’ve raced taped covers in hot and cold, wet and dry including several 112s. There are two keys to it. First is good quality (3m) tape and second is DON’T STRETCH IT as you lay it down. You want it to lay smooth, and that requires that you not be too slack about it, but make it taught and smooth with as little stretch as possible.
Also, clean and dry your rims and the cover before you tape. You want a good, clean surface as free of residue as possible. Having said that, I’ve never been totally anal about this and I’ve never had a problem.
I would be nervous to attached a wheel cover with electric tape, especially if it rain.
Then use duct tape on the inside of the cover, tape the cover to the spokes on one side. On the other side use double
sided duct tape. You’ll do this in addition to the good quality 3M Super 88 tape on the outside along the rim.
I too am interested in this product. Do you have plans to ship to Canada? Thanks.
Michael
Absolutely. We’re in the process of setting our website up to accept international orders right now.
Great. I look forward to hearing when the update is completed and to ordering a cover.
Michael
PM sent regarding issue with ordering and missing information from your website but no reply. Login suggests you saw the message, and new website changes reaffirm that. …guess my business isn’t good enough for a young company? Best of luck
PM sent regarding issue with ordering and missing information from your website but no reply. Login suggests you saw the message, and new website changes reaffirm that. …guess my business isn’t good enough for a young company? Best of luck
Sorry about taking so long to reply. I did read your message and was waiting until we fixed the issue to reply. We’ve been making changes to our website recently and unfortunately the info for the t-shirt got deleted. We will have everything sorted out by the end of the night.
I think you’ll do much better at a $229 price point. Remember, covers are typically used by folks who aren’t spending the $$$ for a dedicated disc (yes, there are other reasons, but it’s about where you land on the demand curve).
Also consider the option of offering a permanently attached wheel/cover a-la J-Disc from the 90s. Get a good quality 28H wheel and bond on the cover, and have a $400-$450 good-to-go disc. FLO is $599 for a disc, so you need to come in well under their price point.
Lastly, add stickers as an option to the disc for some branding, and a more polished look. Doesn’t have to be fancy…use HED and Renn as guides.
Especially when you already have someone making them at a lower price point…
http://www.raltech.co.uk/Prod_3-Wh-Cov.html
The RALTech ones do look great, but they’re nearly as heavy as plastic ones, and at current exchange rates they cost $240-300 depending on the model. And then there’s the cost of international shipping if you live outside the UK. So we think we can offer a much lighter set for around the same cost.
Weight on the Wheelbuilder cover isn’t really that big a deal. Yeah, they’re 440 gms for a box rim. Mine was under 300 when cut for an 808 rim. So, the 140 gm difference is less than 1.5 seconds over a flat 40k. That said, I have beaten and been beaten by that margin in the the last year.
The problem with RALTech is that they don’t answer e-mails, so t’s hard to get a feel for their customer service.
While I am really not interested in your disc wheel cover, I would be interested if you offered a low cost option for carbon fairing covers to bond to popular aluminum rims. Like how the FLOs and HED Jets are made. But I would want to take those faired rims and lace my own choice of hubs to them.
Say my HED Jets crack the rims I or wear out the brake track rather than pay 1500+ to buy a new set I’d like to buy a replacement faired rim to lace up the hubs to. Most likely the hubs will still be good and can be reused.
Zach, I’m new to forum and here to look for used disc vs wheel cover so this option is intriguing. I’m racing Galveston 1/2 in Early April and from your website concerned production might not be ready. I’ll be using Zipp 404 FC. I rented a Zipp Sub 9 on my last tri and without using beforehand, realized it didn’t fit well with the Cervelo P2. Guess the difficulty in putting on and setting the brakes correctly should have given me the heads up and not waiting till 10 miles into the race. So, will they be available in early March, and any fit problems with Cervelo’s?
Zach, I’m new to forum and here to look for used disc vs wheel cover so this option is intriguing. I’m racing Galveston 1/2 in Early April and from your website concerned production might not be ready. I’ll be using Zipp 404 FC. I rented a Zipp Sub 9 on my last tri and without using beforehand, realized it didn’t fit well with the Cervelo P2. Guess the difficulty in putting on and setting the brakes correctly should have given me the heads up and not waiting till 10 miles into the race. So, will they be available in early March, and any fit problems with Cervelo’s?
We should have them ready to ship by the end of February. Of course, there is always the chance of delays, but this is what our manufacturer has promised us. As far as I know it will work with a P2, since other wheel covers do, but I haven’t personally tested it.
While I am really not interested in your disc wheel cover, I would be interested if you offered a low cost option for carbon fairing covers to bond to popular aluminum rims. Like how the FLOs and HED Jets are made. But I would want to take those faired rims and lace my own choice of hubs to them.
Say my HED Jets crack the rims I or wear out the brake track rather than pay 1500+ to buy a new set I’d like to buy a replacement faired rim to lace up the hubs to. Most likely the hubs will still be good and can be reused.
Funny you say that because we are actually working on something very similar to what you’ve described. We’ll be prototyping our version of this idea in the coming months.