What follows is the simple truth without needless marketing fluff. Cocoa Carbon's technology is based on newly proven methods of carbon production. Over the past 5-10 years carbon technology has progressed leaps and bounds for bicycle parts. The notable beneficiary has been bicycle frames, but more recently, carbon wheels have become easily and affordably produced using standard equipment. Recent
refinements such as hookless beads, rim asymmetry, and unidirectional finish help to solidify carbon's place in the mountain, cyclocross, and road wheel category which is where Cocoa Carbon thrives. Cocoa Carbon uses the latest technologies which are incorporated into the wheels and every advantage is passed on to the customer. This is in contrast to other manufacturers where increasing the price for each new minute incremental technology (none of which actually cost more to produce), is common practice. Carbon: Toray carbon fiber used for Cocoa's rims is used for bike frames, handlebars, and in many other industries. Most notably, it was even used for the carbon fiber that largely makes up the Boeing 787. Carbon is incredibly strong. For instance, it's fatigue life is orders of magnitude longer than typical alloy used for rim manufacturing. Carbon also deforms with less plasticity. This helps our rims stay true even after hard landings, sharp rocks, and rock strikes. Hookless bead: This is a production technique that has brought carbon rims to the top in the past two years. Bead hooks were originally meant for alloy rims with tires that were produced to less exact specifications than they are today. Bead hooks held the tire bead in place when the inner tube was inflated. Today's tires are produced much differently than they have been in the past and this makes bead hooks effectively useless and bead hooks even promote burping in a tubeless setup. All of our rims are meant for tubeless setup (but remember you can still use tubes if you prefer). Bead hooks significantly increase the cost of manufacturing carbon rims and reduce strength. Trimming a groove to create a hook makes the rim weaker at the point which is most susceptible to damage and, the alternative of molding a hook adds prohibitively expensive steps to manufacturing. The bottom line is that when a hookless bead is possible (i.e. almost all mountain bike applications) it is better. Our cyclocross offerings need to have a bead hook due to the need for higher pressures some customers use for road and gravel tires. Asymmetry: An asymmetric rim is vastly superior to a symmetric rim and it makes sense. Classically, rear wheels, and front disc brake wheels are made with a dish. This means that the rim isn't centered over the hub, but rather moved toward the one side to allow room for the cassette, shifting components, and disc brake. Asymmetry moves the spoke insertion of the rim away from one side while keeping the rim centered in the frame. This allows a stronger wheel build because spoke tension is more closely matched from side to side. Tubeless bead channel: The profile of our bead channel allows many manufacturer's tires to be mounted without the use of a compressor. No specific guarantees due to the slight variability in bead diameters, but our testing has shown Maxxis tires to mount most easily with a floor pump. Unidirectional finish: Rocks strike rims on mountain bikes. It's that simple. The difficulty is preventing that from causing damage. Unidirectional matte finish is the strongest finish available. In the event that a hard landing cracks the rim, it also prevents propagation in order to get you home in one piece without having to hike. Hubs: Many hub companies use close to the same manufacturing techniques as generic hub companies and increase the price for things like their brand name or an extra pawl. Cocoa Carbon's wheelsets find the most important features of big name hubs and fit those into a lower cost package. Our rear hubs utilize 6 pawl design to keep the degree of engagement as low as possible. (Remember, though, our custom building service can build with almost any hub.) All freehub, axle, and spacing possibilities are available. If your preference isn't currently available, contact us for a custom build (Boost hubs are typically slightly more expensive). Spokes: Each model of wheel is designed with spoke choice in mind. For instance, our XC 29er wheels use Sapim Race spokes which save weight while remaining one of the strongest lightweight spokes on the market. Trail wheels use Sapim Strong spokes to increase strength for the small price of a bit of added weight. By default, all our models use 32h design. We have found the 32h spoke pattern to be THE MOST IMPORTANT controllable manufacturing step that expensive wheel companies skip in order to look flashy, save weight, or claim technological superiority. For mountain and cyclocross applications, 32h is vastly more laterally stiff which keeps the wheel from flexing (especially when hitting bumps and rocks while turning). Spoke pattern is 2 cross by default which is the best mix of lateral stability and power transfer efficiency found on the market today. (Again keep in mind, if you prefer a different spoke count or a different lacing pattern, our custom building service is capable of a wide range of possibilities.) Nipples: Brass. That is really the only way to go for a reliable mountain bike or cross wheel. Alloy nipples save minimal weight and easily shear during manufacturing and re-truing. Large manufacturers use alloy nipples with locking which makes future truing and tensioning very difficult. (Once again, custom wheelsets can be arranged with alloy nipples to save weight, but are not recommended). Custom builds: No surcharge for creating a custom build. Contact Cocoa in order to inquire and get your custom build set up today!
