DT Swiss Carbon Rim Prototype and 20mm Spline One Wheels?

Here at the Lake Garda bike festival we spotted a Santa Cruz Tallboy sitting unobtrusively on the DT Swiss booth. Looking closer it became apparent that the unmarked, black rims are prototypes of a new carbon rim - we're not sure if you can see in the photos, but if you looked closely you could see the carbon weave in places. With the launch of their new Spline One wheelsets, it was becoming apparent that their EXC1550 carbon rims were looking a little dated. While the hubs on the bike here are the old 240s, the rims seem to take on much of the new technology we see in the Spline Ones. The profile looks wider than the old rims, which is a more general push DT are making, and there are no eyelets, suggesting it uses their new washer-based system. When asked, DT were giving little away, they just told us to come back and speak to them at Eurobike...



Alongside the Tallboy was a Lapierre Froggy that we very nearly passed by. Until we noticed that it was running Spline One rims on a Fox 36. At the moment, Spline One wheels are only set to be introduced with a 15mm axle option and the 36 uses a 20mm axle. Looking at the hub, it looks like an older model straight-pull laced up to the new rim. We do hope this is the sign of things to come though, as we think for the European style of enduro, a 36m stanchion fork with a 20mm through axle is still the setup to go for, and we'd like to see the updates in the Spline One wheelset available to people with that setup.