Industry Nine Hydra Enduro S [Rider Review]

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 Industry Nine has long been known to make some of the best hubs and wheels in the mountain bike industry. The Hydra hubs specifically, has one of the higher points of engagement which helps with pedaling out of corners and climbing. Don't believe us? Check out what our customer thinks about their new Enduro S wheelset!

Overview

This is the first set of wheels that I have ever purchased separately from a bike. After reading tons and tons and tons of articles about the Industry Nine Hydra Hub I figured why not what the hell and go for an entire new wheel set that can be transferred to many other bikes. I first installed these on the Yeti SB130, though I got caught in an absolute huge blizzard, the wheels were a welcome upgrade as I could immediately tell they were much more responsive than the stock DT Swiss 1900 wheel set that came with the Yeti. The Hydra hub with its 690 points of engagement made it very easy to pedal over very technical Rocky climbs as you are able to “power feather the pedals with precision to avoid smacking the crank arms into the rocks below the bike. I am running the Hydra Hub with the standard grease as it came from the factory, it does sound like a swarm of bees coming down the mountain side however, the sound is not overbearing and not annoying to myself or other riders, though I am certain if you swap out the grease for hub oil, the sound will increase dramatically making you sound like an intimidating hive of a million angry bees coming down the mountain side, I do know many that do use hub oil substituting the buzz of the Hydra Hub for bell on the handlebar.

Ah now the cost, granted these wheels are not cheap and do come at a premium cost however, don't be fooled by the aluminum construction of the hoops versus similarly priced carbon hoops. I would doubt that carbon hoops would be any better quality. I have been blasting at “full send” at the local bike parks that contain a combination of double blue and double black diamond descents with impressive sized jumps and drops to flat; though I have landed, some of these jumps and drops a bit dirty, occasionally bottoming out the fork and shock as we are early in the season, and I'm still getting my jump-line legs under me. Even with the dirty landings the wheels are holding up great, and are still perfectly true. The craftsmanship involved in the creation of this wheel set is absolutely second to none. You can see the engineering department certainly spent quite a bit of time perfecting the design of not only the Hydra hub, but the entire wheel construction. I do like how these Enduro S wheels use the standard straight pull spokes as it will be easier to find spares, heaven forbid if you break a spoke, though I would think you would be hard-pressed to break a spoke, as the hoop nothing short of perfection.

Installation of the tires onto the I9 wheels was completely seamless the same as any other wheel set. I do like how the I9 wheels comes taped with valve stems installed ready for tubeless operation as all wheels in this price range should. I am only losing about two psi a week in my tubeless set up.

Final Thoughts

In conclusion, yes there is a premium price to pay for this wheel set but you are getting a premium wheel-set that is engineered to be user serviceable making a wheel set that will last many years and that can be passed from bike to bike to bike. I am certain these are the wheels that I will be keeping for quite some time and swapping between many different bikes. I can definitely say I am happy with the purchase, and fairly certain that anybody else would feel the same way.