15mm to 12mm Thru Axle Conversion Kits from JJP&E
Words and Photos by Jennifer Kwai
As the bike industry continues to evolve and choose different standards, consumers are often stuck between them. Early on, thru axle standards were established by mountain bikes with the 15mm. As road and gravel bikes adapted to disc brakes, this standard was first adopted and then modified to 12mm. If your bikes were caught between the transition, it meant changing wheel end caps to accommodate each bike for sharing wheels. This was exactly what I faced when I wanted to use my 650b and 700c wheels on my gravel bikes. That would mean I would need to have two sets of end caps for each bike. Luckily, I stumbled upon a solution--JJP&E's 15mm to 12mm conversion kit.
Joe, the engineer behind the conversion kits, has created various kits for road/gravel/cross bikes that consist of a few pieces with ease to self-install. In my case, this was three pieces for a Classic Open UP. The installation was done in 5 minutes with mounting an adapter piece on either side of the fork and using the provided 12mm aluminum thru axle. This also realized a 53g weight savings (Original 91g vs Conversion 38g). There's a given assumption that you have the 12mm end caps for the front wheel.
In terms of ride quality, there's no discernible difference in the three months of riding that I've done on road, gravel, and mountain bike trails. There's no noise, rattling, or anything! All the parts were well designed and manufactured and I'm a happier rider for the new convenience.
3T Luteus II Team 15mm thru-axle from Open U.P. Classic Frameset
JJBP 3T Luteus II, 15 to 12 Fork Thru Axle Conversion Kit for OPEN U.P.
These kits can be found at Joe's store on Amazon or ebay for $60-$70.
UK customers can go here: https://ebay.com/usr/adaptcycles
Australia and SE Asia should go here: https://forkmods.com