Industry Nine SOLiX M Hubs and Wheels
Internal Width: 25 mm
Diameter: 29’’ only
Rim Material: Aluminum
Stated Weight (full wheelset): 1,425 g
MSRP: $1,405
Internal Width: 30 mm
Diameter: 29’’ only
Rim Material: Carbon fiber
Stated Weight (full wheelset): 1,385 g
MSRP: $2,395
Internal Width: 28.5 mm
Diameter: 29’’ only
Rim Material: Aluminum
Stated Weight (full wheelset): 1,535 g
MSRP: $1,405
Internal Width: 30 mm (front) / 29 mm (rear)
Diameter: 29’’ only
Rim Material: Carbon fiber
Stated Weight (full wheelset): 1,470 g
MSRP: $2,395
Axle Options:
- 15 x 110 mm Boost front
- 15 x 110 mm Torque Cap front
- 12 x 148 mm Boost rear
Hole Count: 24 or 28
Rotor Mount: Centerlock
Stated Weight:
- Front: 120 g
Rear: 227 g
MSRP: $695 / pair
Intro
Industry Nine’s SOLiX hubs aren’t quite brand new — they’ve had versions for road and gravel use on the market for a little while now — but now they’ve released mountain bike variants, too.
The SOLiX hubs aren’t a replacement for Industry Nine’s longstanding Hydra offerings, but instead, they’re a new, lighter, and allegedly faster-rolling option meant for XC and Trail bike use. Let’s see what they’ve come up with.
Hub Design
We’ll start with the hubs, which Industry Nine is offering both in “Classic” guise (standalone hubs with normal drilling for J-bend spokes) and as part of a range of new wheelsets using Industry Nine’s signature straight-pull aluminum spokes (more on those in a minute).
Like the Hydra rear hub, the SOLiX one uses leaf-sprung pawls that engage one at a time to produce an extremely high number of engagement points. However, the SOLiX gets five pawls on a 121-tooth drive ring, for 605 total points of engagement, instead of 6 pawls on a 115-tooth ring for 690 POE on the Hydra. Is that slight reduction in engagement speed (0.59° instead of 0.52°) even noticeable in practice? We kinda doubt it — the SOLiX hubs are still one of the quickest engaging hubs on the market.
What Industry Nine says should be noticeable is a reduction in drag with the SOLiX hubs. The reduced pawl count is part of the equation there, but they’ve also reduced the pawl spring force and decreased the distance that the pawls rotate, with the goals of reducing noise and drag. The SOLiX hubs also get revised seal designs and a redesigned bearing preload arrangement (still non-adjustable, though) to further reduce drag, compared to Industry Nine’s other hub designs over the years.
The SOLiX M hubs are offered only in Boost spacing and with Centerlock rotor mounts. The standalone Classic hubs are available with 24- or 28-hole drilling, and Industry Nine says that they weigh 120 grams for the front and 227 grams for the rear — 17 and 38 grams lighter than equivalent Hydra hubs, respectively.
Wheel Options
Industry Nine also offers the SOLiX M hubs in four different wheelset options, all of which use 24 of their signature straight-pull aluminum spokes, in Industry Nine’s full suite of color options.
The UL wheels are meant for true XC use and the TR options for Trail bike duty; there’s one aluminum and one carbon rim option in each line. The numbers in their names refer to their internal rim widths (e.g., the TR285 has a 28.5 mm internal width). The carbon rims are made by We Are One in Kamloops, BC, and all four wheelsets are available in full-29’’ guise only.
SOLiX M UL250a
The SOLiX M UL250a wheels are the more affordable XC wheel in the lineup. They use an aluminum rim with a 25 mm internal width, and come in at a stated weight of 1,425 grams, with a retail price of $1,405 for the wheelset.
SOLiX M UL300
The UL300 is the carbon-rimmed counterpart to the UL250a, also meant for XC race duty. The SOLiX M UL300 rims get a 30 mm internal width and a lifetime warranty. Industry Nine’s stated weight for the wheelset is 1,385 grams, and they retail for $2,395.
SOLiX M TR285
Moving to the Trail-oriented part of the lineup, the SOLiX M TR285 wheels get a beefed-up aluminum rim relative to the UL250a. The same naming convention holds — the SOLiX M TR285 has a 28.5 mm internal width — and an interesting hollow bead wall design that’s meant to help protect the tire from pinch flats by increasing the surface area of the bead wall area. The bulked-up rim pushes the stated weight for the wheelset to a still-very-light 1,535 grams; the TR285 wheels cost $1,405 for the pair.
SOLiX M TR300/290 DUO
Finally, the SOLiX M TR300/290 DUO is Industry Nine’s carbon-rimmed Trail bike wheel in the SOLiX lineup. As the name suggests, the TR300/290 DUO uses front- and rear-specific rim profiles with a 30 mm and 29 mm internal width, respectively. The front rim gets a lighter layup to prioritize compliance and shed weight; the rear is beefed up a bit to handle the extra abuse that rear wheels tend to receive. The TR300/290 wheelset comes in at a claimed weight of 1,470 grams and runs $2,395.
Weight (and Comparisons)
All four of the SOLiX M wheelsets are notably light for their respective classes. Industry Nine doesn’t publish rim weights for the SOLiX wheels, but below we’ve listed the stated weights for a bunch of competing wheelsets for reference.
1,385 g Industry Nine SOLiX M UL300 (carbon)
1,387 g Reserve 28|XC w/ DT 180 (carbon)
1,388 g Enve M525 w/ Industry Nine Hydra (carbon)
1,411 g DT Swiss XRC 1200 (carbon)
1,425 g Industry Nine SOLiX M UL250a (aluminum)
1,455 g Forge + Bond 25 XC w/ DT Swiss 240 EXP (carbon)
1,468 g Reynolds Blacklabel 309/289 XC Pro (carbon)
1,470 g Industry Nine SOLiX M TR300/290 DUO (carbon)
1,535 g Industry Nine SOLiX M TR285 (aluminum)
1,571 g NOBL TR35 + DT Swiss 240 EXP (carbon)
1,576 g Reynolds Blacklabel 329 Trail Pro (carbon)
1,639 g DT Swiss XMC 1501 (carbon)
1,648 g Enve M630 + Industry Nine 1/1 (carbon)
1,718 g Reserve 30|SL + Industry Nine 1/1 (carbon)
1,740 g We Are One Faction + Industry Nine 1/1 (carbon)
1,758 g Revel RW27 + Industry Nine 1/1 (carbon)
Some Questions / Things We’re Curious About
(1) How do the SOLiX hubs perform? Is the reduction in drag noticeable? How is their sealing and overall durability?
(2) And what about the ride quality of the various SOLiX M wheelset offerings?
Bottom Line (For Now)
Industry Nine’s new SOLiX M hubs and wheels look like interesting additions to their lineup, with promises of low drag, reduced noise, and impressively low weights all around. We’ve got a SOLiX M TR300/290 DUO wheelset on the way for review and will start spending time on them soon. Stay tuned to see how they fare.