Has anyone tried Airwolf wheels?

[dustedrob]

I've got a fork from them recently and the quality was surprisingly good at a reasonable price so now I'm thinking about getting a wheelset which start at around $279 plus shipping which is a great price. Any thoughts or experiences with their wheelsets?
Thanks!

[hebron]

Hi,

Adding my experiences to this thread instead of starting a new one. I bought an Airwolf YFR066 with YFRW005 and their 35mm gravel wheelset both with Novatec 411/412 hubs.
Everything looked good and felt good when i tried them for the first time. But got some bad noises from the rearhub after just 500-800km of riding and stripped the hubs apart and found metal flakes all over the place on the drive side of the hub.
Talked to Airwolf about it and found that a spacer was shredding to pieces. And they told me to remove the spacer and then after that it was no freewheeling in the hub at all.
So talked to Novatec directly for directions on what to do to fix everything, so i sent them pictures of the hub and internals of it.
And Novatec came back and told me I have fake Novatecs, and when I ask Airwolf about it they just tell me they are sorry and the hub are great quality.
But they never answer the question on wheter they are fakes or not, or what hub it really is. And then they stop answering.

The wheels would have been great if the hubs have been good, but for now I regret buying the wheels from Airwolf.
Will update if they sort this thing out, but for now I not getting any answers.

[TidyDinosaur]

Hi,

Adding my experiences to this thread instead of starting a new one. I bought an Airwolf YFR066 with YFRW005 and their 35mm gravel wheelset both with Novatec 411/412 hubs.
Everything looked good and felt good when i tried them for the first time. But got some bad noises from the rearhub after just 500-800km of riding and stripped the hubs apart and found metal flakes all over the place on the drive side of the hub.
Talked to Airwolf about it and found that a spacer was shredding to pieces. And they told me to remove the spacer and then after that it was no freewheeling in the hub at all.
So talked to Novatec directly for directions on what to do to fix everything, so i sent them pictures of the hub and internals of it.
And Novatec came back and told me I have fake Novatecs, and when I ask Airwolf about it they just tell me they are sorry and the hub are great quality.
But they never answer the question on wheter they are fakes or not, or what hub it really is. And then they stop answering.

The wheels would have been great if the hubs have been good, but for now I regret buying the wheels from Airwolf.
Will update if they sort this thing out, but for now I not getting any answers.

Fake novatec hubs? They are already cheap  Do you have pictures?
I use Novatec all the time and apart from standard maintenance like replacing bearings and cleaning/regreasing freehubs they are really great.

[hebron]

It was when I contacted Novatec for help and spareparts i got told that mine were fake, so thats the only evidence I have for now.
But Airwolf replied today after a number of days and would talk to Novatec themselfs and got all the pictures sent to them again.
I have also used Novatecs before with no issues what so ever and thats why i choosed them. Im usually ride MTB so just use the road bike for longdistance training sometimes.
Attached some pictures. The second one shows the spacer thats been worned to pieces inside the hub and the third one shows the metal from the inside when i was trying to clean it out.

[bremerradkurier]

Reminder that Novatec is the "premium" brand for JoyTech.

[TidyDinosaur]

The logo looks totally off... I have the same hub here and the logo is totally different.
SO these are very likely fake

[TidyDinosaur]

Are your hubs matte or is it just the dirt? Novatec 412 hubs are not matte but glossy.

[Serge_K]

if you bought via aliexpress you could ask for a refund, as airwolf sold you something to be Novatec and admitted they lied to you deliberately.
i've rebuilt wheels because i had rims sent as warranty replacement, it isn't fun. if you can, get your money back and start again with a legit seller. Getting wheels from airwolf is a bad idea to start with given the plethora of legit wheel sellers available.

[hebron]

The logo was the thing that the Novatec contact in Europe also mentioned as wrong.

My are matte its not just dirt one them.

Sadly i didnt go through Aliexpress which i regret at the moment.
Yeah, the lesson was learned the hard way this time, and im currently fighting with Airwolf to sort this in someway.

[TidyDinosaur]

I hope you get this solved...

I can't believe there are fake Novatec hubs  I bought a couple of sets for 80 EUR in the past sale. And that is incl VAT... They can't win more dan 10 EUR by using fake hubs I guess... That's a really low move...

[Serge_K]

Ah, if you can't get aliX to step in then negotiate the most reasonable outcome. The spokes & rims are fine, presumably, there's just the rear hub that's shitty (i think it's really really hard to mess up a front hub). You may have to get ready to learn how to rebuild a rear wheel. If you've never tried meditation, that may be the time to start

[hebron]

Ah, if you can't get aliX to step in then negotiate the most reasonable outcome. The spokes & rims are fine, presumably, there's just the rear hub that's shitty (i think it's really really hard to mess up a front hub). You may have to get ready to learn how to rebuild a rear wheel. If you've never tried meditation, that may be the time to start

The wheelbuild itself are not a problem at the moment. And the fronthub is not a problem at the moment either.
Its both of the rear hubs that are messed up. But lesson learned and both the wheelbuilding skills and meditation are next inline to survive this bikebuild

[serenadebikes]

I hope you get this solved...

I can't believe there are fake Novatec hubs  I bought a couple of sets for 80 EUR in the past sale. And that is incl VAT... They can't win more dan 10 EUR by using fake hubs I guess... That's a really low move...

There are more fake DT SWISS. Some sellers will clearly state that they are fake, but some will not.
“Novatec” also has fake ones, but they are easy to tell the difference.
You can see the difference in micro-marking and size