It's wheels again today (and so on).
I built a front wheel using a 16H carbon rim.
Hub is an HB-7700, spokes are CX, and the lacing pattern is outpoke radial.
Since the spokes are CX
the flange holes come with slits.
The HB-7700 has round holes for 36, 32, 28, and 24H,
and aero slit holes for 32, 28, 24, 18, 16, and 12H,
but for some reason Shimano's front hubs have traditionally never offered 20H.
This continues all the way through the 7800, 7900, and 9000 series,
but 20H would logically have far more demand
than 18H for hand-built wheels, I'd think...
If 20H fronts could be had in 7900 or 9000
paired with 24H rears, there would have been plenty of opportunities
to use them in ENVE or Nomlabs wheels.
I think we'd have ended up comparing them with Chris King hubs as an alternative—
offering that same bulletproof durability at the cost of slightly draggy rotation.
And here's another thing.
The HB-7700 actually isn't supposed to be radially laced.
The first Shimano hub to allow radial lacing was the HB-5500,
the 105 front hub from the 7700-series era,
and its successor HB-5501,
and the minor update "HB-5501A".
When tangentially lacing 16H,
your options are basically all-outpoke (or all-inpoke) with 2-cross final weave,
or outpoke and inpoke mixed with no weave crossing (or rather, can't weave),
so radial lacing is the healthier choice by comparison. That's why I went radial.
The 18H front hub existed in the 7400 Dura-Ace and
lower-grade 6400-series 600 Ultegra,
and of course radial lacing was forbidden on these too.
But honestly, doing X1 lacing versus radial lacing means
radial has way fewer issues—like spokes don't loosen as easily—
and besides, there's already one radially-laced spoke in every three even in X1 lacing patterns.
Telling people not to radially lace an 18H hub they've released is
about as unreasonable as the shogun's demands in an old Ikkyu joke.
I'll be building the rear rim next, and it's also 16H,
but the front rim specifies "this is the right side,"
while the rear rim specifies "this is the freehub side."
I'm skeptical whether they actually bother drilling and offsetting them differently,
but I'll follow the markings anyway.
It's a wide-profile WO rim.
It doesn't feel light in hand, but honestly that's reassuring.
I built a front wheel using a 16H carbon rim.
Hub is an HB-7700, spokes are CX, and the lacing pattern is outpoke radial.
Since the spokes are CX
the flange holes come with slits.
The HB-7700 has round holes for 36, 32, 28, and 24H,
and aero slit holes for 32, 28, 24, 18, 16, and 12H,
but for some reason Shimano's front hubs have traditionally never offered 20H.
This continues all the way through the 7800, 7900, and 9000 series,
but 20H would logically have far more demand
than 18H for hand-built wheels, I'd think...
If 20H fronts could be had in 7900 or 9000
paired with 24H rears, there would have been plenty of opportunities
to use them in ENVE or Nomlabs wheels.
I think we'd have ended up comparing them with Chris King hubs as an alternative—
offering that same bulletproof durability at the cost of slightly draggy rotation.
And here's another thing.
The HB-7700 actually isn't supposed to be radially laced.
The first Shimano hub to allow radial lacing was the HB-5500,
the 105 front hub from the 7700-series era,
and its successor HB-5501,
and the minor update "HB-5501A".
When tangentially lacing 16H,
your options are basically all-outpoke (or all-inpoke) with 2-cross final weave,
or outpoke and inpoke mixed with no weave crossing (or rather, can't weave),
so radial lacing is the healthier choice by comparison. That's why I went radial.
The 18H front hub existed in the 7400 Dura-Ace and
lower-grade 6400-series 600 Ultegra,
and of course radial lacing was forbidden on these too.
But honestly, doing X1 lacing versus radial lacing means
radial has way fewer issues—like spokes don't loosen as easily—
and besides, there's already one radially-laced spoke in every three even in X1 lacing patterns.
Telling people not to radially lace an 18H hub they've released is
about as unreasonable as the shogun's demands in an old Ikkyu joke.
I'll be building the rear rim next, and it's also 16H,
but the front rim specifies "this is the right side,"
while the rear rim specifies "this is the freehub side."
I'm skeptical whether they actually bother drilling and offsetting them differently,
but I'll follow the markings anyway.
It's a wide-profile WO rim.
It doesn't feel light in hand, but honestly that's reassuring.