WE PUT SHIMANO’S GRX WH-RX570 GRAVEL WHEELS TO THE TEST

Words and Images - James Raison

Shimano’s 2019 launch of their first gravel-specific GRX groupset brought a flood of brand new products. I was particularly interested because Shimano has reached a level of refinement with their road products for the last couple of years that’s made reviews difficult. They’ve iterated to excellence. With GRX then, I had something new and different to sink my teeth into.

I’m kicking off the GRX content with the creatively named WH-RX570 wheelset. At $749 it occupies an interesting and competitive market segment; the sub-$1000 stock wheel upgrade zone. Those buying a gravel bike with modest hoops will be looking around this pricepoint for a way to add some zing to their rig. You can also expect to see them come specced on plenty of gravel builds from big brands over the coming years.

So, are they any good? Well, let’s find out!

SPEC

Price: $749 AUD
Weight: 1,720 g
Rim: 700c asymmetrical, 21.6 mm internal, 26 mm external
Centrelock disc mount
Angular contact bearings
24 straight-pull bladed spokes front and rear
Spacing: Thru-axle 100 x 12 mm, 142 x 12 mm

I like how the GRX wheels look; minimalist but with a slightly bling logo

Shimano has played it simple with these wheels. Wide-ish, light-ish, shallow rim profile, tubeless, straight pull spokes, external nipples, and their now iconic angular contact bearings. It’s one of the most unremarkable spec sheets I’ve seen. That’s absolutely fine by me though. Shimano has a talent for turning dulls spec sheets into fantastic wheels. I’ve owned and reviewed 5 Shimano wheels over recent years and what they lack in sex appeal they handily make up for with performance.

THE SETUP

I tested the wheels on a Bossi Grit Ti, resplendent with a complete GRX Di2 groupset as well. They’re quite simple to prepare. I whacked on some Schwalbe G-One Allrounds (read the review of the tyres), blasted some Tune One Shot sealant into them, and headed into the world.

Tubeless setup was easy, and they’ve been flawless tubeless since then.

The wheel and tyre combination have done about 1,000 km at time of review. They’ve done everything from commuting to work, mixed terrain riding, rumbling through some rough local trails, and brutal 100-200 km gravel days.

THE RIDE

Gravel wheels in this pricepoint have a fairly simple set of requirements; be low maintenance, rugged, perform well-enough, and easy to live with. The outright performance metrics I’d apply to more expensive, or road wheels, are less important.

The Bossi Grit test setup with a full Shimano GRX setup

Let’s start with rugged. I’ve got a mechanics teardown lower on the page, but generally the wheels have endured some harsh punishment impressively well. I like to push my tyre pressures lower than most, dropping them way down to the outer limits of manufacturer recommendations. While testing them, with 38 mm Schwalbe G-One Allrounds, the rear would often dip below 30 psi and the front to around 25 psi. That resulted in regular violent hits into rocks, tree roots and other obstacles on trails that I’ve buckled other wheels on. The rims regularly bottomed-out hard, to the point where I’d exclaim “oh man, that wasn’t a good one” to my ride buddies. They’ve stayed completely straight with no dings or damage.

Performance has been on-the-money too. I’ve always enjoyed how Shimano hubs roll, and straight out of the box they felt quick. The wheels, matched to the G-One AllRounds, make for a surprisingly rapid setup for its moderate asking price. That setup is properly quick on the sealed tarmac, and one I’d recommend to people who use their gravel bike as a mixed-terrain all-rounder.

Shimano GRX and Schwalbe G-One tyres.jpg

Power transfer is tough to gauge in gravel wheels, given the tyre setup, but I’ve not felt or heard any signs of flex. They spun up quickly and never felt lumpen on steep gradients too, owing to their very respectable weight figures. Freehub engagement is quite decent for wheels at this price, with only a little bit of slowness causing some clunking into the pawls. The freehub body was pristine with the cassette removed too, which is usually a good sign that engagement is quick enough.

Comfort is what I expect from aluminium rims. They do transfer some bumps and vibrations through to your body. Aluminium tends to fall behind the carbon gravel wheels I’ve tested recently as you’d expect from their higher retail price. They’re fine across most terrain, with heavy corrugations being where I found them quite rough.

This picture was taken after 1,000 km of use and the wheels still look pristine

Tubeless behaviour has been flawless from the GRX WH-RX570s. Since setup they’ve held air inconveniently well. My usual strategy is to pump tubeless wheels a little higher than I’d like and let them drop a little be during rides. I had to stop doing that because they barely had any air seep out.

The Shimano GRX WH-RX570 delivered on all the performance markers I’d look for in a gravel wheel at this price. Things got a little more complicated with the mechanics teardown.

MECHANICS TEARDOWN

At around the 900km mark, I took the wheels in to be gutted.

Let’s start with the good; both wheels were straight, in spite of my beating. The front wheel had nothing to report; smooth bearings and even spoke tension. The freehub body is still pristine too with no marks or bites from the cassette.

A look inside the freehub at Shimano’s angular contact bearings

The rear wheel, by contrast, had some problems.

There was play in the freehub body. Not a lot, but enough for a noticeable wiggle from the cassette. Spoke tensions on the non-drive side were variable with a 30-40% difference between high and low values. Moisture had also penetrated the seals on the drive side which had turned the grease a milky colour (pictured below), and making the wheel feel crispy when rolling in the tru-ing stand. The loose ball bearings were sucked out, re-greased, and dropped back in.

The milky coloured grease is the telltale sign that water made its way into the rear hub

It was unexpected to see those issues on wheels relatively early in their life, and that had been ridden predominantly through Australian summer and early Autumn. Those issues are easily fixed but shouldn’t happen so close to new. Water ingress is something I’ll have to monitor over the coming winter because it could wear out the bearing surfaces if it’s allowed to run dirty for too long. It’s hard to know whether it was that particular seal, and that particular freehub that had issues. But I have to report on the set I used and that was my experience.

WRAPPING UP

Shimano has delivered what they always do from a riding perspective; rugged, good value, well-performing wheels. They’ve copped plenty of abuse and hard whacks in my testing period. They are, like so many other Shimano products, both easy and hard to review. Easy because they function so well, hard because they don’t knock your socks off. That’s just where Shimano is at in 2020.

As I said, only time will tell if the mechanical issues I flagged are unique to this set or appear in others. They’re not serious enough for me to advise against buying these wheels, but I would recommend buyers get a service in the first couple of months just to check what’s going on inside the hubs.

VIDEO REVIEW

Disclosure statement: These were sent for review by Shimano Australia. It’s a fully independent review and we make no money from the sale of Shimano products.