Bontrager Carbon Wheels

Are Bontrager’s carbon wheels the best for the price?

Bontrager Line Pro 30

This is the first article my series “Bontrager: a most undervalued brand?”

I’ve now ridden two different Bontrager carbon wheelsets, so this article is based on these:

• Line Pro 30 TLR Boost 29 MTB Wheels
• Aeolus Pro 3V TLR Disc Road Wheels (for gravel bike)

TL; DR

For the price, I’m not aware of a better carbon wheelset. They’re light, about 40–50% less money than most others, and for the mtb wheels (new version), apparently incredibly strong. If budget factors in to your choice, they are absolutely worth looking at.

Basic Specs

Line Pro 30

• $1300 total: $580 front, $720 rear: $
• 1760g: 810g front, 950g rear
• 28 hole
• Lifetime warranty
• No rider weight limit

Aeolos Pro 3V

• $1300 total: $580 front, $720 rear
• 1,575g total: 720g front, 855g rear
• 24 hole
• No rider weight limit
• 2-year free replacement

My Experience

Line Pro 30

First I’ll talk about the Line Pro 30’s as this is the more interesting issue for me and one where I can compare to two other high end carbon wheelsets I own (Santa Cruz Reserve 30 and Crank Bros Synthesis E11). Also, I must stress, that I had the original version of these wheels — Bontrager has revamped them and part of that revamp at least partially addresses my issue (on stiffness) as detailed below, but also adds incredible strength. Here’s BIKE’s review of the new ones where they talk about this. And for reference, here’s their review of the older ones. Do checkout that review of the new ones, as they discuss the strength aspect which is quite interesting.

I first looked into these wheels when I bought my 2018 Santa Cruz Hightower (which can run 27.5+ or 29), which I purchased with stock aluminum RaceFace 27.5+ wheels to get the longer travel fork, and good price overall, and I knew I wanted to try 27.5+, and knew I’d…