Another wheel day (you know the drill).
A customer left me an ENVE1-45 rim wheel to work on.
The hub is quite special—the customer requested I not show it.
It's a large-flange hub comparable to a PowerTap G3,
but with a low-high flange design.
Both sides are laced with DT Revolution spokes in a 4-cross reverse Italian pattern.
Actually, since this hub is a disc brake hub with a 6-bolt rotor mount,
the low-high flange design and reverse Italian lacing make perfect sense.
↑If you flip the hub left-to-right and treat the rotor like a single gear,
the flange relationship becomes like a normal rear hub,
making it equivalent to a high-low flange Italian lace.
The reason for the rebuild request was simple: "It feels mushy."
The spokes are Revolutions, but the tension was still low enough that there was room for further tightening before any spoke wind-up occurred.
Grabbing the crossing points, you could easily hear crackling sounds.
Roughly 70% of the tension I normally build ENVE wheels to.
So could we just get away with tightening? No, for another reason.
↑What was applied to the spoke threads was a high-strength threadlocker—basically heavy-duty Loctite.
This adhesive is effective at preventing loosening after it cures.
It brutally stops the initial rotation of nipple loosening.
But once you turn the nipples even slightly for truing or re-adjustment,
it just becomes a brittle, crusty lump,
and its effectiveness as a threadlocker drops dramatically after that.
If I wanted to tighten further, I'd first have to break up this crusty stuff by torquing the nipples,
but the high adhesive strength means the spokes would twist excessively,
making it difficult to tighten all spokes without causing problems.
So to tighten them up properly,
I'd need to completely disassemble and clean all the crusty residue off the spoke threads.
...If it's basically a rebuild anyway, might as well swap out the spokes too.
Rebuilt it.
24-hole, all CX-RAY spokes, 4-cross reverse Italian lacing with cross-lacing.
Since the lower tension side faces away from the rotor,
I debated whether to do cross-lacing, but decided to go with it.
On my previous disc brake front wheels,
I've done it both ways—with and without.
Post-rebuild tension is about 1.5x what it was before on the free side,
and even higher on the non-free side thanks to the asymmetric lacing effect.
↑That pink rotor isn't the customer's.
A customer left me an ENVE1-45 rim wheel to work on.
The hub is quite special—the customer requested I not show it.
It's a large-flange hub comparable to a PowerTap G3,
but with a low-high flange design.
Both sides are laced with DT Revolution spokes in a 4-cross reverse Italian pattern.
Actually, since this hub is a disc brake hub with a 6-bolt rotor mount,
the low-high flange design and reverse Italian lacing make perfect sense.
↑If you flip the hub left-to-right and treat the rotor like a single gear,
the flange relationship becomes like a normal rear hub,
making it equivalent to a high-low flange Italian lace.
The reason for the rebuild request was simple: "It feels mushy."
The spokes are Revolutions, but the tension was still low enough that there was room for further tightening before any spoke wind-up occurred.
Grabbing the crossing points, you could easily hear crackling sounds.
Roughly 70% of the tension I normally build ENVE wheels to.
So could we just get away with tightening? No, for another reason.
↑What was applied to the spoke threads was a high-strength threadlocker—basically heavy-duty Loctite.
This adhesive is effective at preventing loosening after it cures.
It brutally stops the initial rotation of nipple loosening.
But once you turn the nipples even slightly for truing or re-adjustment,
it just becomes a brittle, crusty lump,
and its effectiveness as a threadlocker drops dramatically after that.
If I wanted to tighten further, I'd first have to break up this crusty stuff by torquing the nipples,
but the high adhesive strength means the spokes would twist excessively,
making it difficult to tighten all spokes without causing problems.
So to tighten them up properly,
I'd need to completely disassemble and clean all the crusty residue off the spoke threads.
...If it's basically a rebuild anyway, might as well swap out the spokes too.
Rebuilt it.
24-hole, all CX-RAY spokes, 4-cross reverse Italian lacing with cross-lacing.
Since the lower tension side faces away from the rotor,
I debated whether to do cross-lacing, but decided to go with it.
On my previous disc brake front wheels,
I've done it both ways—with and without.
Post-rebuild tension is about 1.5x what it was before on the free side,
and even higher on the non-free side thanks to the asymmetric lacing effect.
↑That pink rotor isn't the customer's.