Another day, another wheel (and so on).
A customer dropped off the rear wheel from a 404.
As usual, the request was "it feels a bit soft, so could you rebuild it?"
They mentioned something about the non-drive side being radially laced, but honestly,
it's not like they have technical knowledge about it—they just feel that it's soft when riding.
Actually, another shop has already retightened the nipples on both wheels,
but it's still soft apparently, so we ended up replacing the spokes and hub to rebuild it properly.
The front wheel is radially laced, so it's really just a matter of spoke tension,
but whoever tightened it forced the nipples around without using a spoke wrench,
and there were loads of spokes twisted near the nipple area.
Fortunately they were twisted just barely enough that I could straighten them out,
so I fixed them one by one and returned the front wheel the same day I received it.
As for the rear wheel, there's barely any twisting on the non-drive side,
but most of the spokes on the drive side were twisted.
Some of them are in a state that seems beyond repair.
But since I wasn't going to reuse these anyway, it doesn't really matter.
Rebuilt it.
Evo Lite hub, 20H, black half comp, 4-cross lacing.
I'll do the truing later.
As for the retightening of the original rear wheel, aside from the spoke twisting,
the tightening itself was done properly.
But they had cranked it so tight—just barely over what would make even me hesitate to tension—
that even after the rebuild, the crispness of the drive-side spokes barely increased at all, only helped marginally by the difference in spoke gauge.
The non-drive side, though? That transformed completely.
A customer dropped off the rear wheel from a 404.
As usual, the request was "it feels a bit soft, so could you rebuild it?"
They mentioned something about the non-drive side being radially laced, but honestly,
it's not like they have technical knowledge about it—they just feel that it's soft when riding.
Actually, another shop has already retightened the nipples on both wheels,
but it's still soft apparently, so we ended up replacing the spokes and hub to rebuild it properly.
The front wheel is radially laced, so it's really just a matter of spoke tension,
but whoever tightened it forced the nipples around without using a spoke wrench,
and there were loads of spokes twisted near the nipple area.
Fortunately they were twisted just barely enough that I could straighten them out,
so I fixed them one by one and returned the front wheel the same day I received it.
As for the rear wheel, there's barely any twisting on the non-drive side,
but most of the spokes on the drive side were twisted.
Some of them are in a state that seems beyond repair.
But since I wasn't going to reuse these anyway, it doesn't really matter.
Rebuilt it.
Evo Lite hub, 20H, black half comp, 4-cross lacing.
I'll do the truing later.
As for the retightening of the original rear wheel, aside from the spoke twisting,
the tightening itself was done properly.
But they had cranked it so tight—just barely over what would make even me hesitate to tension—
that even after the rebuild, the crispness of the drive-side spokes barely increased at all, only helped marginally by the difference in spoke gauge.
The non-drive side, though? That transformed completely.